After a tight first quarter, No. 3 Southwestern pulled away from Falconer on the way to a 59-44 victory to set up a finals rematch with No. 1 Eden at 5 p.m. Sunday at Buffalo State College.

“We have been working all season to get back there,” Southwestern head coach Kay Sirianni said. “We were thinking possibly that we would get a chance to face Eden again, too. So we are excited that we won this game tonight so we can be back there on Sunday.”

After graduating several seniors last year, Falconer (13-10) wasn’t quite sure what to expect out of this season, but it did surprise itself going as deep as far as it did. The Golden Falcons were also a runnerup last season, but in Class C, and they almost got back to that point in Class B2.

“When we started this season, we didn’t even know who was going to be on varsity,” Falconer head coach Emily Scholeno said. “A lot people didn’t know what we would do this year losing three big starters and to make it to semifinals and to tie with Frewsburg for second place in league, it is huge. A lot people underestimated us.”

Falconer’s Dani Krenzer attempts to get by Southwestern’s Lauren Cotter during Wednesday’s Section VI Class B2 semifinal at Kenmore West High School. P-J photo by Christian Storms

Falconer hung close with the Trojans in the opening frame thanks to two 3-pointers from Dani Krenzer which matched Southwestern’s Madi McIntyre’s 6-point first quarter as the period ended 12-10. Falconer managed to limit Southwestern’s star Reece Beaver to just one bucket in the first, but that could only last so long.

In the second quarter, Beaver began to get going and with that the Trojans lead began to increase. Beaver scored 9 of her game-high 26 points in the frame. She finished with seven assists, three steals and three rebounds on the night.

“Reece is definitely a leader,” Sirianni added. “Not only is she offensively a standout player for us, she is defensively a standout. She talks to the girls and can run the court as a coach out there on the floor. She puts a lot of pressure on herself, but she also expects her teammates to stand up and play the best that they can.”

While Beaver outscored her average points per game by two points, McIntyre rose to the occasion on the glass with double her average for 16 rebounds and Lauren Cotter added seven more.

“The big thing we’ve been working on with Madi is keeping the ball over your head,” Sirianni said. “Catch high, shoot high and she did a great job on the boards tonight. Defensively we couldn’t take her out, we needed her and she actually created a lot of fast break opportunities because she got the ball out of the paint quick.”

The Falconer scoring picked up a little in the second half, but couldn’t match Southwestern. Augustine Krenzer scored 11 of her 15 points in the second half and her sister Dani finished with a team-high 16. Also, finishing strong for Falconer was Kayla Lynn with seven rebounds and four steals, and Emily Zaranek with six rebounds.

“Dani has helped every girl love the game and same with Kayla,” Scholeno said about her seniors. “Dani’s offseason work has really helped push the girls to want to do the same and love the game.”

Joining Beaver and McIntyre in double-digit scoring was Bella Sirianni with 10 points to go along with her four assists. Several Trojans contributed to the stingy defense as McIntyre grabbed four steals; Braya Beaver, Reece Beaver and Cotter all had three steals; and Kira Ricker had two.

After the Southwestern (16-5) victory, No. 1 Eden (19-3) downed No. 4 Akron 76-47 to set the Class B2 finals rematch.

“We are so excited,” Southwestern’s Reece Beaver said about heading back to the Class B2 finals. “We worked for this all season and it’s just so exciting to play at Buff State again and try to win that section.”

FALCONER (44)

KLynn 2 0 5, AKrenzer 6 1 15, DKrenzer 6 1 16, EZaranek 1 0 2, MZaranek 0 0 0, Harper 1 1 3, Smith 1 1 3, Holmberg 0 0 0, ALynn 0 0 0, Neal 0 0 0. Totals 17 4 44.

SOUTHWESTERN (59)

RBeaver 9 7 26, Cotter 0 1 1, BBeaver 1 0 2, Sirianni 4 2 10, Hamilton 0 0 0, McIntyre 5 2 12, Pearson 0 0 0, Ricker 3 0 8. Totals 22 12 59.

3-point goals–KLynn, AKrenzer 2, DKrenzer 3, RBeaver, Ricker 2.

Falconer 10 10 13 11 — 44

Southwestern 12 18 15 14 — 59