Shooting woes against arguably the best team in the state doomed the Harrisburg Bulldogs against the Salisbury Panthers, 57-41, in the Class 2 state quarterfinals in Salisbury on Saturday afternoon.

Salisbury, ranked at the top of the Class 2 polls, is now two games away from repeating as state champs. The Panthers play Weaubleau at 4 p.m. today (Wednesday) in the state semifinals at Mizzou Arena. A win would advance them to the state finals for the second year in a row.

With Salisbury’s outstanding gym packed nearly to capacity with 1,122 tickets sold prior to tipoff, Saturday’s game had all the makings of a classic state tournament showdown between two of the best Class 2 teams in the area. But Harrisburg struggled right out of the gate at getting shots to fall. The offense was getting good open looks, but the ball bounced off the rim, and Salisbury didn’t allow many second chances.

Meanwhile, the Panthers’ top two scorers quickly got to work. Senior Mason Stapleton scored on Salisbury’s opening possession. Senior phenom Cooper Francis then netted the first of three 3-point baskets on the night to take a 5-0 lead.

It wasn’t until the bottom half of the opening quarter that Harrisburg would finally get on the board when senior Wyatt Lind banked a shot.

The Bulldogs would come within two points as the opening quarter was winding down when junior Trace Combs sank a pair of free throws. But Stapleton struck again with nine seconds left to put Salisbury on top 13-9 after one quarter.

“We didn’t hit enough shots, and we didn’t finish easy ones well enough to win the ballgame,” said Harrisburg coach Kyle Fisher. “We took a lot of them, and they were good ones. Sometimes, the ball just doesn’t go in the hole. We were getting good open looks. That’s basketball. We knew we had to play another really good ballgame coming in here. And part of playing a really good ballgame is making shots and finishing well. And I thought we defended well enough to win. I thought we rebounded well enough to win. Our attention to detail was good. Our effort and energy were phenomenal all night.”

The second quarter was action-packed despite minimal scoring in the opening minutes. Francis converted a pair of free throws, and Stapleton scored from the inside to give the Panthers an eight-point cushion. Harrisburg again struggled, netting only a pair of free throws from sophomore Caleb Sager in the opening half of the quarter. But it was anything but a bland showing. Both defenses were on point and gave the rowdy crowd plenty of action.

Stapleton picked up a charge midway through the period. The Salisbury big man then retreated to the bench with his third foul a half a minute later. That evened out the size in favor of the Bulldogs, who scored only free throws over a span of nearly seven minutes from the end of the first quarter through six minutes of the second. Finally, Harrisburg found the rim with baskets by Rylee Robinson and Combs in the final two minutes of the half.

Stapleton, however, is not the only size on the Panthers’ starting five. Senior Hayden Wooldridge, along with Francis and Stapleton, round out Salisbury’s dominant top three players. And with Stapleton on the bench, Wooldridge got to work, scoring six of his 13 total points in the second quarter.

By halftime, Salisbury had inched ahead to lead by seven, 26-19.

Francis opened the second half with a three-point play, sinking a bonus free throw just 39 seconds in to give the Panthers their first double-digit lead of the night. But anyone who has seen a Harrisburg game knows how fast the Bulldogs can erase a deficit. Harrisburg showed shades of their district-final comeback early in the third quarter. Senior Carter Bremmer scored two big 3-point shots and Combs connected on two shots in the paint to twice cut the score to five points.

Harrisburg got another bonus when Stapleton was whistled for his fourth foul, sending him back to the bench, where he would stay until midway through the final period. That’s when Francis showed why he was named the Lewis & Clark Conference Player of the Year. He sank back-to-back 3-pointers to go into the final stanza with a 10-point lead.

“I thought at that time, that’s when Francis took over a little bit,” Fisher said. “I thought we did a really good job on him the whole night. We made him work for everything. He didn’t get a lot of those transition buckets or offensive boards that he normally gets. And that was a big focus of ours coming in to try to keep him away from those. I thought we did a pretty good job of that, but I thought once [Stapleton] went out, I thought that’s when Francis decided to try to take over a little bit. And that’s what great players do. I thought that was a big difference in the game.”

Francis scored a putback early in the fourth quarter to finish off his solitary eight-point run.

Harrisburg again found it difficult to score in the opening minutes of the final period. Even with Stapleton on the bench, the Bulldogs were desperate for points and often settled for 3-point baskets that bounced into the hands of Wooldridge and Francis. Finally, down by 14 with 5:32 left, Lind was able to connect on the long ball. But every time Harrisburg would make a shot, Salisbury had an answer. 

Wooldridge sank the Panthers’ final field goal of the night with 3:16 left. A bonus free throw made the score 50-36.

The Panthers would finish their night from the line, sinking seven of 12 shots as Harrisburg resorted to fouling in order to stop the clock. That strategy saw three Bulldogs foul out. Sager was the first, followed by Combs with 2:21 left. An emotional Lind left the court for the final time in a Bulldogs jersey with 1:09 on the clock. The senior ended his high school career with 10 points in his last game.

“I told our guys afterward, that they had nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to hang their heads about. It was one of, if not the toughest, postseason runs that a Harrisburg team has ever had to go through,” Fisher said.

The Bulldogs made a clean sweep of their new district on the road at Clopton before winning a state sectional game at Canton on the previous Tuesday.

Until this season, Harrisburg competed in District 7 alongside Salisbury and other area powerhouses New Franklin and Glasgow. The Bulldogs lost a seven-point decision to the Panthers in last year’s district final.

Even with the move to District 5, Fisher and his team knew they would eventually run into Salisbury, which has held the top ranking all season.

“The other side of that is that if we were in the same district, we maybe got to play Salisbury in Glasgow on a neutral court,” Fisher theorized. 

And although Salisbury did have home-court advantage on Saturday, a vast swath of the crowd was wearing Bulldog red and all but matched the home crowd’s volume.

“We gave Salisbury a good battle today, but they were a better team and deserved to win,” Fisher said.

“We almost did it,” he continued. “And if everybody’s goal is to win a state championship, at some point, you’ve got to beat all the great teams that are in your way. But I’m proud of our guys for finally breaking through and winning a district title.”

Combs led Harrisburg in scoring with 12 points. The junior reached the 1,000-point milestone during the state sectional on Feb. 27. “He’s a really good player, and the best thing about him is we’ve got him for one more year, and we’ve got a lot of guys coming back next year,” Fisher said.

Lind added 10 points, followed by Bremmer with eight on a pair of 3-pointers in his final high school game.

Defensively, Fisher said the goal was to hold Francis to 20 points or less. The Salisbury senior scored a game-high 24 points with three 3-point buckets and 7-for-8 shooting from the line.

“He’s just a phenomenal player. We tried to deny him the ball as much as possible and just make him work for everything. And I thought we did. I thought he hit two tough threes early. And after that, I thought we did a good job of making him work for everything,” Fisher said.

“He’s an exceptional player, and you’re not going to shut him down completely. We talked about how we wanted to try to hold him around 20. But we just wanted to try to deny the ball as much as possible. And when he did catch it, really collapse and load up on his drives and make him shoot over the top of us to get all the way to the rim. I thought we did a pretty good job of that most of the night.”

Salisbury’s top three combined to score 54 of the Panthers’ 57 points. Stapleton finished with 17 points and sank five of seven free throws. Wooldridge added 13 points and went 3-for-4 from the line.

For Harrisburg, the end of the line means saying goodbye to five seniors. Lind, Bremmer, Zollie Robinson, Hunter Cole, and manager Austin Starbuck leave after helping their team to a 19-12 season. This year’s district championship marked the first for this group of seniors who finished all four seasons with winning records.

The Bulldogs faced more than their share of ups and downs this season. Cole could not play his senior season after suffering a knee injury during football. But he remained a member of the team all year. Bremmer was sidelined with a month-long illness through most of the first semester before rejoining the team around Christmas. And a player shakeup midway through the season was another setback for the team.

“When we played such a tough schedule like we do, you’re going to have some lows,” Fisher said, reflecting on his season. “I think at one point we were 9-9, 18 games into the year. And at that point, if you told me we were going to go on the road five games in a row and come within a game of getting to the final four, I would have told you that you’re nuts. But credit to our seniors who just kept this team together and just would not let us slip down. And I’m just so proud of them. I just cannot say enough about them.”

The Bulldogs also had a series of highlights throughout the season. They finished runner-up in the Glasgow Tournament and won a solid game over Van-Far in the Filbert Shootout in Mexico.

Fisher summed up his senior class with one word: “tough.” 

“They’re one of the toughest groups, if not the toughest group, that I’ve ever coached for the amount of things that they dealt with. From Hunter going down before the year even started, to the ups and downs, and then Carter being out the first half of the year, to all the lineup shakeups and just how they persevered and how they battled through everything. Kind of the motto of our team the last month of the year was ‘fight.’

“I’ve never seen a group fight like this group, and our seniors were a big reason for that. Carter Bremmer, Wyatt Lind, Zollie Robertson on the floor, Hunter Cole as a ninja player, and then Austin Starbuck as manager. Those five seniors are going to be really, really hard to replace, and not just what they can do on the floor, but just their leadership, their toughness, and how much they meant to the program.”

Despite losing those seniors, Harrisburg does have a lot returning next season. Combs leads a group of five juniors that includes fellow starter Bryce Ott. After that, starter Caleb Sager heads up four sophomores who will be expected to produce next season.

“It’s hard to think about right now when you’re losing such a great group of seniors. But we have a lot of talent coming back next year and it’s been a while since we have made a deep run and then have so much coming back the following year,” Fisher said.

Saturday’s game also marked the end of Harrisburg’s tenure as a member of the Lewis & Clark Conference. The Bulldogs will join fellow L&C member Fayette to form a new conference, the Central State 8, with six other teams in the fall. Harrisburg became a full member of the L&C during the 2016-17 school year.

With their season over, the Bulldogs will have to watch from the sideline as Salisbury makes their second run at claiming a state title. The Panthers will step onto the court at Mizzou Arena with an overall record of 28-2. The high-scoring Weaubleau Tigers hold an identical record and enter the final four for the first time since 2000, when they finished third in Class 1. The winner will advance to the championship game at 6 p.m. on Thursday. The loser will play for third place on Thursday at noon.