The Liberty Christian Eagles rolled to their second straight girls Missouri Christian Schools Athletic Association Division 1 Championship last week.
The Eagles (26-4) won all three games of the tournament by 40 or more points to cruise to their second consecutive title. They beat Faith Christian Academy 61-20 in the championship game. The Eagles jumped out to a 35-12 halftime lead to cruise to the victory. Senior Adison Roden paced the Eagles’ offensive attack with 17 points. Senior Andrea Mueller added 14 points. Gracie Foran and Sophi Mueller also scored double digits with 10 points each. Foran also secured 10 rebounds.
“We won last year at conference and state,” Liberty Christian coach Butch Clark said. “So we expected to do it again. And we prepped for that all year. We had a really tough schedule. We played a lot of good public school teams… I think we were prepared for it. And the kids just kept getting better as the year went on. Which that’s the way you’d like to see it them playing their best games at the end of the year.”
The Eagles have won the MCSAA title the last two years. They lost in the championship game the previous two years. The Eagles have played a tougher schedule over the last few years to prepare themselves for postseason play.
“ Three years ago, we got beat in our championship game at state,” Clark said. “And then two years ago, we got beat again. When these kids were freshmen, I didn’t think our schedule was tough enough. And we got there. And we weren’t ready. We ran into a team that kind of intimidated us and we played that way. Then the next year, it happened again. So the last two years we’ve really focused on getting better competition especially in January. And I think that’s helped us.”
Over the past four years, the Eagles have compiled a 103-16 record, including a 45-1 conference record. They won the regular season conference title all four years. They won three conference tournament titles. The tournament was canceled one of the four years.
Seniors Andrea Mueller and Adison Roden finish their careers second and third place on the Eagles’ all time scoring leaderboard. Clark added Gracie Foran is the team’s best rebounder.
We’re going to lose our top two rebounders. Our top two scorers. So we lose a lot,” Clark said. “But we got five, six kids coming back that know how to play basketball. And we don’t have a lot of size. We’re going to probably put five guards on the court next year but they’re five good guards. They’ll be able to shoot and move the ball. We’ll play a different style.”
The Eagles concluded their season with a home game against Southern Boone. The Eagles lost 87-69.