Cedar Rapids Prairie’s Courteney McCrary was a one-girl wrecking crew in the second half and her teammates did a nice job picking up after her Tuesday night on their home floor as the Hawks cleaned conference co-leader Xavier, 54-47.

McCrary, a rock-solid 5-foot-9 senior prone to foul trouble, knocked down seven of eight shot attempts after halftime on the way to a game-high 21 points.

While she was scoring from all angles, Prairie (11-5, 7-2 MVC) built a one-point lead into a 16-point bulge with 5:30 to go.

The Saints (9-7, 6-3) put on a 7-0 run of their own down the stretch in a comeback bid that was too-little too-late.

“We really wanted to win this game,” said McCrary, who ended up with four fouls but still managed to play most of the minutes. “They beat us last year in the substate final at Linn-Mar. So we came out playing hard for this one. Our team was real focused.”

The majority of McCrary’s baskets came on spin moves under the basket (in both directions) around Xavier’s bigger post players.

“I knew I had to play smart against their tall girls,” she said. “I had to stay out of foul trouble, first of all. And I got around them quick before they could block my shot.”

Saints Coach Tom Lilly, always gracious in defeat or victory, was impressed. “She was going around our girls like their feet were stuck in the mud,” he said.

But, Lilly stressed, it wasn’t just McCrary that caused a skin-tight first half to turn into a runaway in the second.

“Their three top kids played a lot better than we did. We knew we had to contain at least one of them, and we didn’t do it,” he said.

Besides McCrary’s 10-goal outburst, running mates Madison Dellamuth notched 13 points and Alisa Weiland 11.

“When you have three score in double-digits against you, you’re probably not going to win,” said the veteran Xavier mentor, whose defensive-minded squads pride themselves on holding opponents under 50 points.

Dellamuth, a sure-handed floor leader who recorded six assists and three steals with only two turnovers, said the Hawks were prepared for a hard-nosed defensive battle.

“Coach told us we had to play hard right from the start and not let up or they’d come back and take it away from us,” said the savvy 5-foot-6 junior, who often passes up her own shots to look for teammates.

“Our mindset was to attack the whole way to the end and not wait for the clock to expire. So that’s what we tried to do.”

The first half was nip-and-tuck, but Prairie opened the second half with an 8-0 sprint.

Xavier’s Maddie Bertsch hit two quick jumpers to momentarily stem the tide, but the Hawks responded with a 13-0 streak to all but put the game out of reach.

“Keep pushin’ the ball,” Prairie Coach Steve Doser yelled from the bench. “Keep pushin' it.”

Even with a big lead, he knew his friend Lilly’s bunch wouldn’t call it quits. “This was a very good win, against a very good team with a similar style,” Doser said. “We knew we’d have to do a lot of the little things to win it.”

As it turned out, the Hawks did almost everything well. They outrebounded the taller Saints 27-23 (with worhorse Cyerra Hutchins pulling down nine of them) and committed 13 turnovers to Xavier’s 20.

Both teams shot well. Xavier was 19 for 42 (45.2 percent), while Prairie was 21 for 49 (42.8 percent).

“I thought our defense was outstanding all night,” Doser said. “We look for our defense to create offense.

“We forced a lot of turnovers. And we had an extremely good flow to our offense tonight.”

XAVIER (47): Kayla Armstrong 4 1-3 9, Hayley Deutmeyer 4 1-2 9, Sarah Dickes 1 2-2 5, Maddie Bertsch 3 0-0 6, Ashley Stulken 2 2-2 6, Morgan Breitbach 2 0-1 4, Abby Watson 1 0-0 2, Lizzy Bailey 0 0-0 0. McKenna Andersen 2 0-0 6. Totals 19 6-10 47.

PRAIRIE (54): Cyerra Hutchins 2 2-4 7, Alisa Weiland 4 3-3 11, Courteney McCrary 10 0-0 21, Madison Dellamuth 4 4-5 13, Olivia Usher 0 0-0 0, Taylor Moenk 0 0-0 0, Grace Gudenkauf 0 0-0 0, Makenzie Stoffer 0 0-0 0, Chrisandra Freeman 1 0-0 2. Totals 21 9-12 54.

Halftime - Prairie 22, Xavier 21. 3-point goals – Xavier 3 (Andersen 2, Dickes 1), Prairie 3 (Hutchins 1, McCrary 1, Dellamuth 1).