---

Struggling through some late free throw shooting woes, the Dodgeville girls basketball team had to fight off a late Prairie du Chien rally for a 47-42 SWC win Friday night.
The loss by Prairie was just their second in conference action, putting them two games behind league-leading Richland Center. The Dodgers avenged an earlier season loss of 35-28 to the Lady Blackhawks and evened their conference mark at 3-3 and put them at 8-7 overall.
The Dodgers started fast and held a 13-3 cushion by the end of the first quarter.
"Finally we were able to set the tempo against them," said Dodger coach Josh Busch. "They slowed us down when we played them there and we never got into a rhythm. They missed some shots early and we were able to grab the rebound and push the ball up the floor. We kept them out of any flow early."
Prairie battled back some, but the Dodger lead was still 27-19 by halftime.
Senior Laura Ley helped the Dodgers in quarter two with her five points on the night, prompting Busch to say, "Laura had a nice second quarter for us."
"At halftime I told the girls that Prairie would come out strong in the second half. We won the first three minutes and were able to stretch the lead on them and we needed it," the Dodger coach said.
His team went up as much as 17, but went just 1 for 10 from the free throw line down the stretch in the fourth quarter. Those misses and Prairie senior Morgan Banasik putting in two three pointers and scoring 12 of her game-high 18 points let the Lady Hawks back into the game - but they were to get no closer than the final mostly thanks to freshman Taylor Stanek going 2x2 from the charity stripe early in the fourth and sophomore Megan Zoet hitting all four of her tosses and adding a bucket for six points.
"Megan had a huge 4:00 stretch for us in the fourth," Busch pointed out. She and Taylor were big down the stretch."
On the night, senior Rachel Pope led the Dodger scoring with 11 points with Stanek adding nine.
Morgan Banasik was the lone Prairie player in double figures.
"Credit Macy (McConnell) for making Morgan earn all the points she got tonight. She constantly had a hand in her face and was shadowing her and limited her two just six points before the final quarter," Busch said. "Morgan was able to knock down a couple of threes and hit some tough shots in the fourth. Also, in the fourth, we let them get some offensive boards that we weren't giving up earlier."
SCORE BY QUARTERS
Prairie du Chien 3 16 6 18-42
Dodgeville 13 14 9 11-47
BOX SCORE
Prairie du Chien 42 (fg, ft, tp) Skemp 3-0-6, Mo. Banasik 7-2/3-18, White 1-0-2, Ma. Banasik 3-1/1-7, Nicholson 0-1/4-1, Rickleff 4-0/5-8. Totals 18-4/13-42. F-22. 3-pointers: Mo. Banasik 2.
Dodgeville 47: Stanek 3-2/2-9, Pope 4-2/8-11, Crowley 0-0-0, Ley 2-1/2-5, Neil 0-0-0, Bakker 3-1/1-7, McConnell 3-0/6-6, Baumann 1-0-2, Lee 0-0-0, Dalsing 0-0-0, Zoet 1-4/4-6. Totals 17-10/19-47. F-16. 3-pointers: Stanek, Pope, McConnell.
JV-Dodgeville 41 Prairie du Chien 40
For more Varsity Action photos go to www.varsityaction.zenfolio.com