Staff photo by Travis Rosenau Sleepy Eye’s Brea Mertz puts up a shot in the paint over New Ulm Cathedral’s Shay Wilfahrt during a Tomahawk Conference girls’ basketball game on Tuesday at Cathedral High School.

NEW ULM — Sleepy Eye had its foot on the gas from start to finish in Tuesday night’s Tomahawk Conference girls’ basketball game with New Ulm Cathedral, downing the Greyhounds 79-20.

After Emily Schommer stopped a 6-0 Sleepy Eye run to start the game with a bucket inside, layups from Brea Mertz and Kadence Hesse kicked off a 22-0 scoring run that put the Indians ahead 28-2. The Indians got the majority off of their points off of Cathedral turnovers during that run, and they didn’t make things any easier on Cathedral’s offense after that.

A pair of free throws by Shay Wilfahrt ended the Greyhounds’ scoring drought, but the Indians answered back right away with back-to-back buckets to lead 32-4.

The Greyhounds got a 5-0 run with less than 10 minutes left in the half after Schommer got a bucket inside and Wilfahrt got an off-balance 3-pointer to roll in. Wilfahrt added a pair of free throws late in the half and Schommer drove inside the paint for 2, but Paige Haala sank a buzzer-beating 3 to put the Indians up 46-15 at halftime.

The Indians started the second half out with an 11-0 run to force a Greyhounds timeout and then extended that to an 18-0 run out of the timeout to lead 64-15. Schommer ended the run on a bucket inside with a little more than 11 minutes to play.

The Indians closed out the game on a 6-0 run to give them their largest lead of the night and final score.

Sleepy Eye was led by Mertz’s 29 points, while Kaydince Thoms had 21 points and Hesse had 18 points.

Cathedral was led by Schommer’s 10 points, while Wilfahrt had 9 points.

Sleepy Eye (3-0) is at Springfield for a 7:30 p.m. conference game Tuesday, while Cathedral travels to Hector for a 6 p.m. conference game this Friday.