Franklin wins by 39, onto semistate. 'We look forward to things like this, celebrating.'

BEDFORD — The heavy favorite in its sectional and a favorable regional draw left Franklin with a clear path to the Class 4A semistate. But after narrowly surviving an upset bid by Whiteland in the sectional final, a stunner in Saturday's Class 4A regional vs. Evansville North didn't seem entirely implausible.

It took all of about three minutes or so for the Grizzly Cubs to assuage any concerns.

Lauren Klem and Emma Sappenfield fired the opening salvo with a pair of 3-pointers and the lead was 17-1 by the time North registered its first field goal. Franklin forced 16 turnovers, unofficially, in the first half while committing just one itself, and its lead ballooned to as many as 30 in the second quarter.

Final score: 69-30.

After weathering a close call last weekend, Franklin (24-3) used Saturday's trip to Bedford to reaffirm its status among the best in 4A.

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"Whether we won or lost, we just wanted to play better," coach Mike Armstrong said. "If we're going to get beat, let's get beat playing well and playing hard. If we do those two things, we can live with the result."

In hindsight, it was probably foolish to read much into the Grizzly Cubs' less-than-inspiring performance last Saturday vs. Whiteland.

It's all about survive-and-advance this time of year and with a glut of seniors who were part of the program's 2022 state runner-up finish, it was well-equipped to reach that next gear in its game and reach semistate for the third time in four years.

The intensity was different, Sappenfield said. "We were ready to play."

"We focused on bringing the energy and having confidence," Klem added. "We can definitely tell where our energy level is going into the game and we're so close that we can help bring each other's energy level up."

Regardless of circumstances, Franklin's performance was really impressive.

Analysis should probably begin on the defensive end where Franklin forced a dozen or so turnovers over the first eight minutes alone. The press made it extremely difficult for North — which averaged 8.4 turnovers per game — to inbound the ball, let alone advance it past mid-court, and even then connecting on passes and finding open looks proved nearly impossible.

Maddy Knies led Evansville North with 11 points, while Vanessa Nankwenya finished with 10.

The Huskies, who had not won their sectional since 2020, finish the season 16-11.

"Klem is so quick, she just gave our point guard a lot of problems," North coach Tyler Choate said. "I also felt like we made some uncharacteristic turnovers that led to easy buckets, which got the momentum going for them. … "When you look at the experience Franklin had, they seemed composed and our kids seemed a little shell-shocked by the moment."

On the other end, Franklin's shooters were downright prolific. Of their 25 field goals, 13 came from behind the arc with seniors Kennedy Urban (14 points) and Klem (14 points) accounting for eight triples. Urban's 3-point barrage has been a welcome surprise, with the standout volleyball player preceding Saturday's outburst with critical 3s against both Columbus North and Whiteland during sectionals. "Kennedy's always been a good defender and a good teammate, but now she's starting to shoot the ball better than she has all year," Armstrong said of Urban, who was 6-for-35 from 3 coming in.

The key recently, the 5-6 Urban said, has been confidence in herself and learning to move on after misses. "We're all there for each other," she added, "so my teammates are like, 'Just keep shooting. No matter how many shoots you miss, just keep shooting.'"

Brooklyn York tallied 11 points, Sappenfield added nine and Erica Buening logged six for the Grizzly Cubs, who have 11 seniors on their roster — many of whom played starring roles in their 2022 state runner-up finish.

"Not to say we're used to this, but it's so exciting and we look forward to things like this, celebrating," Sappenfield said. "And that's ultimately the goal for us, to keep cutting down the nets."

Follow Brian Haenchen on Twitter at @Brian_Haenchen.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: IHSAA girls basketball: Franklin beats Evansville North for regional