Staff photo by Jeremy Behnke Sleepy Eye St. Mary’s Madison Mathiowetz drives to the basket against Sleepy Eye’s Brooklyn Moldan during Friday’s Section 2A girls’ basketball playoff game at St. Mary’s. Mathiowetz led all scorers with 34 points as the Knights advanced with a 77-49 victory.

SLEEPY EYE — The Sleepy Eye St. Mary’s girls’ basketball team got one step closer to the state tournament with a 77-49 rout of Sleepy Eye on Friday in the Section 2A, North Subsection playoffs on Friday.

Madison Mathiowetz turned in another dominating performance, leading all scorers with 34 points. She also had 12 rebounds, three steals and three assists. Sydney Windschitl poured in 17 points to go along with her six rebounds, three steals and two assists. Reagan Severson finished the game with 15 points, five rebounds, three assists and two steals.

While the final score indicates it wasn’t a close game, the Indians did keep up early on in the game. Trailing 7-3, the Indians got a couple of baskets, including one from Kaydince Thoms, to tie the game at 7-7. That prompted the Knights to call a timeout, and when they returned to the floor, they ran away.

An 11-0 run, highlighted by a 3-pointer from Severson and four baskets from Mathiowetz, moved the Knights to an 18-7 lead, a lead they would not lose the rest of the way.

Sleepy Eye, meanwhile, missed some easy shots inside and struggled from outside, missing all nine of its 3-point attempts in the first half.

Baskets by Windschitl and Severson put the Knights up 26-9 with 6:50 left in the first half and Mathiowetz later hit a jumper to make it 32-14. Severson’s 3 with 1:35 left in the half gave the Knights a 37-18 advantages and they took a 41-20 lead into halftime as Mathiowetz scored before the halftime buzzer.

It was more of the same in the second half as the Knights continued to force turnovers. The Indians looked much better in the second half, but they were unable to go on any type of offensive run to get back into the game. Windschitl hit a 3 to make it 49-26 and Mathiowetz later stole the ball and scored on a layup to put the Knights ahead 60-31. A later Severson 3 made it 75-48 with 3:05 left in the game.

Kadence Hesse led the Indians with 21 points. Brooklyn Moldan finished with 11 points and Breaunna Mertz scored 7 points for the Indians, who ended their season at 12-8.

St. Mary’s (20-0) will host BOLD, the No. 2 seed in the North Subsection, at 7 p.m. on Tuesday. BOLD (10-4) defeated Buffalo Lake-Hector-Stewart 58-51 on Friday.