The St. Anthony Lady Bulldogs quest to win the National Trail Conference Basketball Tournament ended Thursday night in Beecher City.

The Neoga Lady Indians raced to an early double-digit lead and never looked back, en route to a 44-31 victory in a semifinal game of the annual conference tourney.

That not only avenged a 60-49 loss to St. Anthony just a week ago, it propelled the No. 2 seed Lady Indians into the championship game. They will take on the Altamont Lady Indians, who upset No. 1 CHBC, 60-53 in double overtime.

The championship game is set for 7 p.m. Saturday at Beecher City High School. The Lady Bulldogs and CHBC will play in the third place contest at 5:30 p.m.

Neoga jumped to a 17-7 lead after the opening eight minutes. St. Anthony was able to trim the lead to 27-20 at halftime, but the Lady Indians didn’t let it get any closer. They led 35-25 after three periods.

Sydney Richards scored 15 points and Trista Moore added 11 for Neoga, which improved to 19-4 on the season.

Riley Guy was the only player that reached double figures for St. Anthony, finishing with 11 points. Abbi Hatton added eight.

The Lady Bulldogs, now 16-8 on the season, will face a CHBC team that lost just its second game of the season to Altamont and is now 19-2. In an earlier meeting in December, the Lady Bobcats rallied in the fourth quarter to top St. Anthony 51-50.

In the other semifinal game, Grace Nelson poured in 38 points to lead Altamont to the upset. The game was close throughout and was tied 47-47 at the end of regulation and was still knotted at 51-51 after the first overtime. The Lady Indians then outscored CHBC 9-2 in the second OT to complete the upset.

The lineup for the final day of the tournament is now set:

•2:30 p.m. – Brownstown/St. Elmo vs. Windsor/Stew-Stras (seventh place)

•4 p.m. – Dieterich vs. South Central (consolation)

•5:30 p.m. – St. Anthony vs. CHBC (third place)

•7 p.m. – Neoga vs. Altamont (championship)