HELENA, Mont. – Freshman point guard Bailey Pasta hit a three-pointer with five seconds left on the clock to lift the Carroll College women's basketball team to a 58-56 win over Rocky Mountain in the regular-season finale.
 
The win secured the Saints the third seed in the Frontier Conference playoffs and the opportunity to avenge last Thursday's 48-44 loss to Montana Tech. The Saints host the Diggers at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the quarterfinals of the tournament.
 
"Third place all alone is great," head coach Rachelle Sayers said. "It means a home game with Tech, which our kids are excited for. So it's back to work tomorrow, and try to get rested and ready and get ready to go back at it -- and we get a chance, I guess, to avenge some of our frustration from the last Tech meeting."
 
Rocky Mountain started the game with momentum and built an 11-6 lead before the Saints got things rolling. Carroll went on a 22-3 run to take a 28-14 lead with 2:27 left in the first half. Rocky closed the half with a 6-0 run to cut the deficit to 28-20 at the break.
 
Carroll extended their lead to 45-28 with 10:47 left before the Bears went on a 10-0 run to cut the Carroll lead to 45-38 with 6:37 left.
 
The Saints built their lead back to 55-40 with 4:40 left in the game before falling silent and letting the Bears back in the game.  Rocky went on a 16-0 run and took a lead with two Whitney Mitchell free throws with 20 seconds left on the clock.
 
On senior night in front of a big crowd, everyone expected either Bailey Snelling or Kalee Junkermier to take the shot but Pasta was wide open in the corner and a driving Junkermier found her for the biggest shot of her young career.
 
"There's one thing I'll say about this senior group is how unselfish they are," Sayers said. "I've talked about it all year, but you see a player like Kalee Junkermier, in her senior year with everything on the line, and she draws and kicks to a freshman that's open in the corner instead of trying to force a shot. That says a lot about what this team's about, and I could not be more proud."

Junkermier scored a game-high 21 points to lead the Saints and Cassidy Hashley scored 12 points and a game-high nine rebounds. 
 
The win gives the Saints a 9-5 conference record (18-10 overall) and the third seed in the tournament behind regular-season champion Westminster and second-place MSU-Northern.
 
The Saints host six-seed Montana Tech while the University of Great Falls will host Lewis-Clark in the other quarterfinal game. Both games will take place at 7 p.m. Tuesday.