KNOX — Karns City's 22-15 halftime deficit did nothing to temper the prospect of losing to rival Moniteau for the third time this season.

But the Gremlins saved their season in the second half.

KC held Moniteau to just 10 points over the final two quarters and prevailed 40-32 in a District 9 Class 3A girls basketball semifinal at Keystone High School Friday night.

The Gremlins (12-10) will face Brookville in the district final at a time, date and site to be determined.

Moniteau won the two regular season meetings with Karns City, 38-32 and 46-43.

“We knew from our two losses against them this season that we needed to change a few things,” said KC senior forward Livia Andreassi. “We made the adjustments.”

One of them was containing Moniteau star forward Emma Bair, who scored a combined 32 points in the regular season meetings. She was held scoreless in Friday's second half. Even when she was scoring in the first half, the Warriors didn't seem too anxious to get her the ball inside. Six of her 10 points came on 3-pointers.

Moniteau opened the game with seven consecutive 3-point attempts.

“That was not the plan,” said Warriors' coach Dee Arblaster. “The plan was to pound the ball in to Emma and we worked on it for the last two weeks. Why we decided tonight that we didn't need to do that, I don't know. We just didn't execute.”

Even with Moniteau out of sorts on offense, the Warriors still held a 24-18 edge with three minutes left in the third period. The Gremlins, however, closed the quarter with a 9-3 spurt, which included a trey from Alyssa Stitt and Emily Hegedus' off-balance bucket from the free throw line just before the buzzer that tied the game at 27.

“That was a big shot,” KC coach Steve Andreassi said of Hegedus' basket. “It got our fans into it.”

Moniteau's last lead came when Aslyn Pry sank a basket for a 29-27 lead with 6:30 left in the game. From that point, Karns City outscored the Warriors 13-3.

Andreassi's 3-pointer put the Gremlins up for good, 32-29, with 4:47 left.

The Warriors had committed just three turnovers in the first half. They had 10 in the final two quarters, keeping them from finding any consistency on offense.

“We switched to a flat-out man defense in the second half,” said Coach Andreassi. “Holding them to just 10 points, that was the difference in the game.”

Hegedus led all scorers with 19 points. She began the night 3-of-10 from the field, but made three of her final four attempts.

“There's always more pressure in the second half,” said the senior guard. “Moniteau is a good team. I'm just glad I was able to help the team win and get to the title game. I don't want my high school career to end.”

The Gremlins also got timely scoring from other players. Stitt, Andreassi and Olivia Mourer combined for 21 points. Getting points from players other than Hegedus has been a struggle at times for the Gremlins.

“We're probably not going to win if it's just Emily scoring for us,” Coach Andreassi said. “The other girls, they don't need to reach double digits, they just need to contribute and they did tonight.”

KARNS CITY 40

Alyssa Stitt 2 3-4 9, Emily Hegedus 6 7-8 19, Olivia Mourer 2 1-2 5, Livia Andreassi 2 1-2 7, Madison Kelly 0 0-0 0, Sara Knox 0 0-0 0. Totals: 12 12-16 40.

MONITEAU 32

Kristin Auvil 1 0-0 3, Andie Arblaster 2 1-2 6, Izzy Bair 2 2-7 7, Aslyn Pry 3 0-0 6, Emma Bair 4 0-0 10, Bailey Hartle 0 0-0 0, Alex Hartle 0 0-0 0. Totals: 12 3-9 32.

Karns City 7 8 12 13 — 40

Moniteau10 12 5 5 — 32

3-point goals: Karns City 4 (Stitt 2, Andreassi 2); Moniteau 5 (E. Bair 2, I. Bair, Arblaster, Auvil).

Next: Karns City vs. Brookville, District 9 Class 3A title game, TBD