The Seymour girls’ basketball team opened up a 31-17 lead by halftime and rolled to a 60-44 win against Scottsburg on senior night at the Lloyd E. Scott Gymnasium.

Seniors Maci Lubker, Mikayla Fee, Morgan Ritz, Emilee Pollmann and Lindsey Hume started for the Owls and combined for 33 points and 20 rebounds.

“They were the first group of freshman I had when I came in, so we’ve been together for the entire time,” coach Jason Longmeier said. “We’ve been through some rough times, and some good times together. I have a great appreciation for four-year athletes anymore because it’s so hard to go through a season and the things that are expected from you in the off-season.

“These young ladies are better role models than they are basketball players, so I’m appreciative from what they’ve been able to do from that standpoint.”

The Owls used a 10-0 run late in the first period and early in the second to move on top 19-9.

A three-point play by Kayla Griffin closed the run at 6:45. Ritz closed the first half with a 3-pointer that gave the Owls a big boost going into the locker room.

The Warriors closed the gap to 33-26 at 5:20 of the third period before Lubker made a 3-pointer that built the lead back to 10-points, and Lauren James followed with another three, Lubker drove for a layup and Pollmann scored two free throws to lift the Owls to a 43-34 lead at the end of the quarter.

Emma Waskom hit two free throws with 5:26 remaining to bring the Warriors with in five at 45-40 before Lubker added two free throws and Griffin hit a jumper for a 49-40 lead and the closest the Warriors came after that was seven points.

Seymour (17-4) had balance with Ritz and Griffin both scoring 14 and Lubker added 11. Griffin had 9 rebounds to help the Owls to a 32-29 advantage in that department.

“I felt in the second half we really never to in a rhythm,” Longmeier said. “I felt the first half we kind of got the game to be played the way we wanted it played. I really felt, in the third and fourth quarter, until late when we were able to pull away, I thought Scottsburg controlled the tempo and had game being played the way they wanted it to.

“We wanted more tempo, we wanted the game faster. We knew with our numbers they would have a hard time running with us and in the second half we were never able to get that going.”

Scottsburg coach Donna Cheatham played her starters the entire first three quarters. Paige Barrett was high scorer with 16.

Longmeier said he felt like the Owls did a good job defending Scottsburg’s leading scorer Taylor Means in limiting her to five points.

“They’ve got three players who can play,” he said. They do a good job with those three players. We were able to hold Means down a little bit and never allowed her to get going. There were times in the game were Barrett was a load for us. We thought Fee’s length early on would give her problems, and it did.”

Longmeier said he feels like the Owls’ depth has improved throughout the season.

“We talked about it in the locker room, now we’re getting to the point where kids who have been playing 16-17 minutes up to this point, every game at this point means so much. Their time may go down, their time may go up.

“We’re going to play the five players that are playing well. If they’re playing well for 16 straight minutes, then they’ll play for 16 straight minutes. Once you hit the tournament that’s what seems to happen. You seem to find a solid rhythm with seven-eight player, and tonight we were playing 10 players.”

The Owls (17-4) will travel to New Albany on Thursday for their final Hoosier Hills Conference game. They have claimed at least a share of the HHC title and need a win to claim the crown outright.

“Our opportunity on Thursday is to win the outright conference championship for the first time,” Longmeier said. “We’ve never won the HHC outright. We tied for it in 2007-08. This is a chance to be conference champs, in my opinion, in one of the better conference in Indiana.”