By Ryan Atkinson

sports@joplinglobe.com

CARL JUNCTION, Mo. — The Carthage Tigers, for the most part, kept the Carl Junction Bulldogs out of their comfortable run-and-gun offense, and held Mannie DeCastro — CJ’s star on Friday night — to just five points.

The Tigers, however, didn’t have an answer for Tesia Lahm.

Lahm, Carl Junction’s 5-foot-6 senior guard, scored a game-high 25 points and led the Bulldogs to a 55-42 win over Carthage in the title game of the St. John’s Sports Care Girls Basketball Classic at Carl Junction High School.

“Tesia played a great game,” Carl Junction coach Brad Shorter said. “She is always a threat to score and she just went out there and did what she always does.”

Lahm, who averaged 18.4 points last season, was 10-of-18 from the field and 5-of-8 from the foul line. Her jumper at the 6:27 mark of the first quarter was the game’s first points, and her eight points in the second quarter sparked the Bulldogs to a 24-14 halftime lead.

Despite those numbers, a spot on the all-tournament team and the title of championship game MVP, Lahm turned the attention to the rest of the Bulldogs.

“I have to give the credit to my teammates,” she said. “I couldn’t have scored those points without them ... they were amazing all tournament long.”

Carthage coach Bobby Waggoner said Lahm was the key for Carl Junction.

“We just couldn’t keep her in front of us,” Waggoner said. “She’s a great player and it’s awfully hard to hold her down.”

Bulldog junior Devyn McPherson provided the defensive muscle down low for Carl Junction. The 5-foot-8 forward was a big reason the Tigers couldn’t make full use of their height advantage.

“If there were a defensive MVP for this tournament, Devyn would win it,” Shorter said. “She came up huge for us all tournament ... she shut people down.”

The Bulldogs got buckets from four different players — Lahm, McPherson, DeCastro and Amanda Storm — and jumped out to an 8-2 lead.

Carthage scored five straight to cut the lead to 8-7, but the Bulldogs — spurred by Storm’s 3-pointers — went on a 9-3 run and led 17-10 with 5:11 left in the second quarter.

The Tigers closed to within four points one time, but Carl Junction began pulling away in the second half and took a 50-30 lead on McPherson’s jumper at the 4:18 mark of the fourth quarter.

“I felt like our defensive pressure helped us out a lot tonight,” Shorter said. “It was kind of a dead game at times and it wasn’t really a fast-paced game like we want, but our defense stepped up.”

Carthage kept the Bulldog offense relatively in check, but the Tigers shot just 35 percent (16-of-45) from the field and 38 percent (7-of-18) from the foul line.

“We didn’t really let them run wild like they are capable of doing,” Waggoner said. “We just couldn’t get the ball in the basket, especially early. We were down 10 points at halftime and that’s pretty hard to make up against a team like Carl Junction.”

The Tigers got 17 points from 6-foot junior Denise Taylor and 12 from 5-4 junior Ryann Hartley.

Carl Junction’s Lindsey Gordon added eight points after Lahm’s 25 while McPherson and Lauren McRae each had six. DeCastro and Storm chipped in with five a piece.

Webb City 58, Nevada 43

The Webb City Cardinals bounced back nicely from their semifinal loss to Carl Junction and ran past the Nevada Tigers for third place.

The Cardinals outscored Nevada 22-8 in the second quarter and carried a 39-20 lead into the locker room. Webb City led 52-28 at the end of three quarters, but the Tigers outscored the Cardinals by nine in the fourth.

Nicole Hudson scored 16 for the Cardinals while Kaitlin Jaeger added 13 and Sharenda Campbell chipped in with 12.

Nevada scored 27 of its 43 points from behind the arc with nine 3-pointers. Kadee Hughes, Jordan Bell, Taylor Means and Heather Thomas each nailed a pair of 3s while Lindsay Rice hit one.

Rice, Bell and Means each scored eight points, Hughes had seven and Thomas added six.

East Newton 44, Seneca 35

Lindsey Bragg scored 13 points to lead the Patriots past Seneca in the fifth-place game.

Melea Cook and Jacci Yust had 12 and 10 points, respectively, for the Indians.