After beating Eureka, 71-63 on March 1, the Lancers advanced into the final round of the District tournament. They were set to face Parkway Central who were seeded second in the District tournament; the Lancers were the first seed.

When the game began, the Colts got off to a blazing start and ended the first quarter up 23-10 against Lafayette. Despite getting outscored by 13 points, Lafayette was able to mount a comeback by playing stellar defense. They held Parkway Central to seven points in the second quarter and went into halftime down 30-29.

After the start of the third quarter it was all Lafayette. The Lancers scored 15 in the third quarter and 24 in the fourth quarter to close out the game and win their third straight District championship 68-54.

“The second quarter we came, we mixed things up defensively and came out,” Head Coach Scott Allen said. “I think we played more aggressively, assertively and we came out a little timid. You know you come out timid in a game like this and you’re gonna get off to a rough start, but our kids came back second quarter, played with a lot of energy and got us back in the game at halftime which was huge.”

Lafayette’s senior basketball players scored a combined 46 points in the game. Luke Finley led the group with 28 points, Nathan Hinton scored 12 points and Jared Hinton chipped in six points. Unfortunately, senior Will Stonecipher didn’t score any points but he contributed with a steal, an assist and had a good defensive presence throughout the game.

“We didn’t return a lot from last year’s team. These are a lot of new faces and Luke is the only guy who played at all last year. So I’m just so proud of these guys, winning Conference and winning Districts, it isn’t easy. Sometimes I think we get spoiled and think it’s easy, it ain’t easy. So three in a row for both Conference and Districts is pretty special,” Allen said.

Lafayette will play CBC on March 9 at St. Charles West high school starting at 7:45 p.m.