Lady Warriors rewarded

IGHSU releases Class 1A-3A brackets; ranked Rockford receives first-round bye

Staff Report

Though everyone makes it to the postseason in Iowa girls high school basketball, the regular season still means something.

At least it does for the Rockford Lady Warriors.

The 13th-ranked team has a near perfect record (15-1) and is atop the Top of the Iowa-East Conference standings. Such as distinction has granted Rockford a first-round bye in the Class 2A-Region 5 bracket.

Rockford will host the winner of Belmond-Klemme at Central Springs first-round game on Feb. 14 at 7 p.m. The winner from that quarterfinal will face the winner of West Fork vs. Lake Mills/St. Ansgar quarterfinal in the semifinals on Feb. 17 at 7 p.m.

If Rockford advances to the semifinal, it will host it.

The bracket final will take place Feb. 20 at 7 p.m. in Parkersburg.

Though the bye may help, it will likely be a challenging road to the finals for the Lady Warriors, who had to come from to defeat Central Springs on the road earlier this season, and suffered their only loss thus far to West Fork to split the regular-season series.

Central Springs is favored to advance to face Rockford in the quarterfinals, and West Fork is favored to advance to the semis.

The top seed in the bracket is No. 4-ranked and undefeated North Linn, who will host their quarterfinal Feb. 14 at 7 p.m.

Vying to play North Linn will be Nashua-Plainfield (2-13), who will face Columbus Catholic (7-8) in Waterloo, Feb. 11 at 7 p.m. in the first round.

In the Class 1A-Region 3 bracket, North Butler (5-7) will travel to Ackley to face AGWSR (10-4) in the first round, Feb. 9 at 7 p.m. AGWSR recently was ranked in Class 1A before being dropped from the top 15 last week.

The Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union released the Class 1A, 2A and 3A brackets on Monday. Class 4A and 5A brackets will be released on Jan. 30.