In a clash between a pair of undefeated girls’ basketball powers, Minot was able to generate more offense than Aberdeen Central Tuesday night.

The top-rated squad in North Dakota held the Golden Eagles to just three points in the final 6:51 of the game to pull away for a 54-43 win during the Buffalo Wild Wings classic at Wachs Arena.

“The outcome wasn’t what we wanted and there’s a lot things we need to work on and focus on, but I was proud of our guards’ confidence and willingness to take those outside shots,” said Central coach Paiton Burckhard. “That’s what we need to have happen all season.”

Central trailed just 44-40 early in the fourth quarter when the offense dried up. While the Majettes didn’t exactly sprint away, they methodically built the lead up to 53-40 by the time the Golden Eagles scored again with 1:57 left.

“We play two different styles of basketball,” Burckhard said. “We like to set things up in the halfcourt, they like to run and gun. We’re not a team that likes to do that, so if we’re going to play that game, it’s going to be hard and that’s what happened a lot.”

What also happened too often for Central was turning the ball over. Minot forced 24 turnovers, many of which led to fast-break opportunities.

“What killed us was our ability to take care of the ball, limiting turnovers, and then they turn it into transition baskets,” Burckhard said. “And that was just something that we talked about a lot, to not see that follow through or that fight, they go on a six-point run, that’s hard. That’s hard to come back from and then you get tired.”

And when Central desperately needed some offense, there was none to be found.

“We lost all of our energy,” said Central junior Lauryn Burckhard. “I just think we just got shut down a little bit, don’t know why, but it’s something to work on.”

The Golden Eagles got off to a solid start, building a 15-7 lead in the opening quarter, thanks in part to Kamdyn Borge, who came off the bench for seven-first period points.

“Obviously we’re not very deep. We play very few girls. We’ve got a lot of leadership on the team,” Borge said. “We talk about lighting a spark and getting out there, so I knew that if we don’t have that on the court, we need to bring it. And things like that kind of get us started and get the momentum going for us.”

While Central eventually lost its lead in the second quarter, it was able to stay in the game by drawing fouls and cashing in at the charity stripe, where the Golden Eagles made 11-of-15 free throws in the opening half.

“Although we’re a bigger team, our dribble penetration, our driving, stuff like that, really gets our offense started,” Borge said, “and I think bringing those fouls in and getting to the free throw line were really strong with all of that.”

The Majettes threatened to break the game open in the third quarter, grabbing a 42-31 advantage, but Central put together a 9-2 rally to set the stage for the pivotal fourth-period stretch.

“They’re a really good team. They’re a really strong team,” said Burckhard, who led Central with 17 points. “They kind of play faster basketball, like AAU basketball, where we like to slow it down and run sets. Getting to play against that is kind of tougher, but we tried to adjust to it.”

Minot was able to matchup with Central inside, while most team’s can’t. Oklahoma commit, 6-foot-3 Leelee Bell made life tough on the Golden Eagles’ ability to score in the lane.

“We knew that we needed to step up if we have people guarding Taryn (Hermansen) that don’t normally guard Taryn,” Borge said. “Having matchups like that, we know as us guards, we have step up and take ownership for a lot of things and just get things started.”

Bell and Selia Stevick each had 19 points to lead the Majettes, 6-0 on the season.

While the setback snapped Central’s four-game winning streak, Lauryn Burckhard said there many positives to take away from the contest.

“I’d rather play a hard game like that than win by 30 points. They’re a really good team. I think it really helped us just to show that we can play with those teams,” Burckhard said. “We just have to keep up what we were doing. We had spurts where we went on runs. We’ve just got to play that the whole game.”

Central, which hosts Yankton on Saturday afternoon at Golden Eagles Arena, will look to have more consistency that it displayed in spurts against Minot.

“We definitely had some good moments,” coach Burckhard said. “There’s a lot to be proud of, but being consistent, 110 percent from beginning to end, our girls are more than capable of that. I think that’s the most frustrating. … Definitely a lot of learning points and building from this game, for sure.”

MINOT (6-0): Ariana Rood 1 0-0 2, Kinley Bartsch 2 6-8 10, Selia Stevick 8 0-0 19, LeeLee Bell 7 2-2 19, Pearl Aberle 1 0-0 3, Hadlea Faul 1 0-0 2. Totals 20-47 8-10 54.

ABERDEEN CENTRAL (4-1): Emma Dohrer 1 6-7 9, Lauryn Burckhard 7 0-1 17, Taryn Hermansen 1 5-6 7, Kamdyn Borge 3 2-5 10. Totals 12-36 13-19 43.

Minot 13 29 44 54

Aberdeen Central 15 22 36 43

3-point field goals – Stevick 3, Bell 2, Aberle; Dohrer, Burckhard 3, Borge 2. Total fouls – Minot 14; Aberdeen Central 11. Rebounds – Minot  23 (Bell 6); Aberdeen Central 33 (Kenadi Withers 8, Hermansen 7). Turnovers – Minot 13; Aberdeen Central 24. Assists – Minot 14 (Rood 5, Bartsch 4, Bell 4); Aberdeen Central 8 (Withers 3). Blocked shots – Minot 6 (Bell 4); Aberdeen Central 0. Steals – Minot 19 (Stevick 4, Rood 3, Eva Knutson 3, Bartsch 3, Bell 3); Aberdeen Central 6 (Dohrer 2, Burckhard 2, Borge 2).