The Perryville girls basketball team is in a familiar spot over the holidays as it has been the last three seasons. The Pirates are the number two seed in the 4th Annual FSCB Girls Holiday Tournament at West County High School.
Perryville has played in the tournament since its inception and has reached the tournament championship game each year, only to fall to the host West County each time.
The Bulldogs are once again the top seed and if seeds hold, a matchup between the two squads is on the horizon.
However, Perryville must first reach the title game of the 12-team tournament to do so. Perryville (5-3) received a bye in the first round and will take on the winner of seven seed Bismarck and 10 seed Viburnum.
Perryville is currently on a two-game winning streak having defeated Festus and Valle Catholic.
Last season, Perryville defeated Bismarck (68-40) in the second round and beat Valle Catholic in the semifinals to reach the championship game.
In that tournament championship game, Perryville led 9-5 early and played well in the first quarter, West County led 24-16 at the half. The Lady Bulldogs began the second half with seven consecutive defensive stops, and were in no hurry to force shots while steadily pulling away, bleeding the clock They followed a four-minute stretch of shutout defense with nearly six minutes of shutdown defense after that in the fourth quarter, and surrendered one made field goal over an eventual 23-5 scoring run. In all. Perryville made seven field goals in the game and had just nine total points in the second half as West County won 47-25.
That was the lowest output for West County, the three previous matchups in the specific tournament.
West County (8-1) will enter the tournament with two straight victories over Fredericktown and Jefferson R-7 and are scoring 62 points per game.
The Bulldogs and Pirates are the top two seeds in the tournament with Hillsboro as the three seed and Cuba as the four. Crystal City is seeded fifth and Jefferson is sixth.
The tournament runs from Dec. 27-30 with the title game scheduled for 3 p.m. on Friday.
