Senior guard Phoebe Frentzel celebrates a play. The Tommies lost to the University of North Dakota Saturday at the Summit League tournament 80-67. (Evan Neubauer/The Crest) 
Junior guard Amber Scalia scores against the Denver Fighting Hawks. Scalia shot 7-24 for a total of 18 points. (Evan Neubauer/The Crest) 
The Tommies celebrate a goal from the bench at the Summit League tournament quarterfinals. (Evan Neubauer/The Crest) 
Tommie senior forward Sammy Opichka pushes against Fighting Hawk sophomore forward Nevaeh Ferrara Horne. Opichka ended the game with nine points. (Evan Neubauer/The Crest) 
Senior center Jo Langbehn opens against the North Dakota Fighting Hawks. (Evan Neubauer/The Crest)
Despite senior center Jo Langbehn’s 26-point performance Friday afternoon, the St. Thomas women’s basketball team couldn’t outpace the University of North Dakota, and fell 80-67 at the Denny Sanford Premier Center in Sioux Falls.
The Tommies couldn’t break out of the quarterfinals for the third year in a row and ended the season 17-13 overall, their best record in the Division I era.
“They were really attacking us and trying to go downhill on us, and unfortunately, we were backing up,” coach Ruth Sinn said.
Langbehn ended her career as a Tommie with six 20-plus point performances across her senior season.
St. Thomas had taken care of UND in both their regular season matchups but couldn’t find an answer Friday night.
“I think today was more so the pressure of the tournament for a lot of us. I think just this atmosphere —(Sinn) talks about it being an opportunity to be playing in a big arena— that kind of exposure stumps us a little bit,” Langbehn said.
She also grabbed seven rebounds, with five coming across the offensive glass. Her second offensive board turned into a put-back layup to end the half, keeping the team down just 35-31.
The missed shot was the 17th attempt from junior guard Amber Scalia in just the first half. Scalia pushed the offensive pace early, often shooting in the first fifteen seconds of a possession. She ended the game 7-24 from the field and just 3-10 from deep.
“I think it’s a mentality of, ‘You’ve got to give it your all, you’ve got to give it everything.’ My mentality, especially in the past two years has been, ‘Do it for the seniors and give it all you got defensively, offensively,” Scalia said, “Yeah I started off hot. I was feeling it. I think it’s just a different mentality just playing out there with a lot of confidence.”
The team as whole only shot 37.3% from the floor and 29.6% on threes.
St. Thomas and UND actually made the same amount of shots and the Tommies made double their opponent’s three-pointers.
The difference can be found in the free throw column: The Fighting Hawks made 20-24 and the Tommies were just 3-6.
“Something that we have been working on is trying to be aggressive and trying to get to the free throw line. And really be balanced and stuff like that,” Sinn said, “Jo had a really great game with obviously 26 points, but how can we get her to the free throw line?”
Scalia’s backcourt partner Jade Hill had an uncharacteristically quiet night on offense. She scored only four points —she averaged 14.7 entering Friday— on eleven shots.
Hill’s four points were enough to move her to third all-time in scoring in program history with 1,558 points. Earlier in the season, she also set the program assist record and her five on Friday gave her 474 across her four years.
The guard led the current senior class and Sinn’s first Division I recruiting class over the last four years.
“This group is a group that for four years, they have carried the torch. They have been the foundation of this program and really trying to set an example for years to follow,” Sinn said.
Guards Gabby Johnson and Phoebe Frentzel, and forwards Jordyn Lamker and Sammy Opichka rounded out the senior class playing together for the final time.
Opichka ended with 11 points on 13 attempts, including a trio of three-pointers in the fourth quarter that kept the Tommies within striking distance of the Hawks.
Opichka also grabbed ten rebounds, including four on offense. St. Thomas outrebounded North Dakota by one.
“They were hungry. These young ladies wanted it at this point and they wanted it for each other,” Sinn said.
Not even Langbehn’s performance could outdo UND sophomore forward Kiera Pemberton, who scored 16 of her 30 points in the final quarter.
Pemberton was also the primary defender responsible with keeping Hill’s offense in check all night.
“Kiera of course put up a ton of points, but we also gave her an incredibly difficult matchup, asking her to guard Jade Hill all night. She did a phenomenal job stepping up on that end of the floor,” UND coach Mallory Bernhard said.
When asked about which part of Friday’s game will stick with her the most, Scalia paused almost ten seconds before deciding she wanted to choose to remember a positive.
“Throughout that whole game, we were together the whole time. I think we’ve gone through games this season of that not being that case, but that’s the biggest thing. We were together all game, we just couldn’t pull it out,” Scalia said.
Adam Mueller can be reached at muel7541@stthomas.edu.
The Crest student media’s coverage of the Summit League tournament is sponsored by U.S. Bank. The Crest is the independent student-run media at the University of St. Thomas.
