Lansing ? The crying eventually would end Saturday night, but the question of what could have been probably will linger for the rest of the Eudora High players’ lives.

With eight seconds remaining in their Class 4A sub-state championship against Kansas City Ward, the Cardinals held a 50-47 lead and were hoping to advance to the Class 4A state tournament this week in Salina.

But as the final seconds ran off the clock, so too did the Cards’ title dream. K.C. Ward tied the score, got the ball back on a turnover and then won, 52-50, on a controversial buzzer-beater by Beth Baughman.

“It’s one thing if you go into 16 seconds and you’re down by five, and you know you’re probably going to lose,” EHS coach Cara Kimberlin said. “But to go into 16 seconds and you’re up by three, and the girls on the floor are so high because they knew they had it.

“In 16 seconds your emotions go from totally high to as low as it can get for an athlete.”

While it might have felt like 16 seconds to an emotionally drained Kimberlin after the game, the whole process actually took only half that time.

Ward’s Debbie Dumovich hit her third three-pointer off a double screen to tie the contest at 50-all with eight seconds left.

Eudora’s Lauren Kracl, who scored 21 points and grabbed 17 rebounds in her final game, then threw an inbounds pass that struck teammate Carrie Lister in the side of the head, and the ball bounced out of bounds.

Ward called a time out and then set up an inbounds play on the baseline.

Eudora's Lauren Kracl pulls up for a jumper over Kansas City Ward's Urse Charbonneau. The Cardinals were stunned by a 52-50 last-second loss to the Cyclones on Saturday night at Lansing High.

Almost as soon as the ball touched Baughman’s hands, an auxiliary air horn, which was being used in place of the normal gym’s buzzer, sounded — but a second remained on the clock.

Baughman took a quick dribble to her left and spun around letting loose of a 12-foot jumper that found nothing but the bottom of the net.

Officials talked it over with each other and the scorer’s table and ruled the shot was good.

“You have to trust their judgment,” said EHS athletic director Dave Durkin, who said Eudora would not protest the ruling.

A Sunflower Broadband Channel 6 video of the play showed that the ball clearly left Baughman’s hands before time expired.

“It was so loud in there I don’t know if you could have heard it,” said Kimberlin, whose team finished with a 16-7 record.

6Sports video: Final seconds crush Cardinals’ hopes

“Last night when the horn was going off in our boys game it was cutting in and out, and wasn’t real loud. There’s no way you would have heard it if they hadn’t of brought that horn out. But then, of course, you’re going by a person’s pushing it.

“But that’s neither here nor there,” Kimberlin added. “We had some opportunities to strengthen our lead and we didn’t do some little things.”

Eudora trailed 40-38 entering the fourth, but Kracl took the game over.

She got the ball back for the Cards on a block and tied the game at the opposite end on a putback. A jumper by the 6-foot senior nearly a minute later put EHS up by four.

Her only misses in the quarter came on two shots that rimmed out. With 1:07 left, Kracl connected on another chip shot for a 49-47 lead before the stunning ending.

“But you know what, those girls went out and did what I asked them do, which was play their butts off for 32 minutes,” Kimberlin said.

Three seniors — Rachel Abel, Ashley Moran, and Jodi Wingebach — in addition to Kracl concluded their careers under Kimberlin, who had coached them since the seventh grade.

“I knew even when they were seventh graders this group was going to be special,” she said. “The hardest thing was to go into the dressing room and address them.”