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KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- The Lady Blues held an 11-point lead at halftime Sunday against Emporia State in the title game of the Centennial MIAA Basketball Championships and they held on for a 68-59 win to sweep the conference regular season and tournament trophies this year.

No. 10 Washburn (28-4) earned the automatic bid to the NCAA tournament and has been the No. 1 team in the NCAA South Central Region the last two weeks. The Lady Blues will find out Sunday night at 9:00 if they will get the chance to host the eight-team tournament. Emporia State (21-8) was fourth in the latest ranking.

The tournament will begin Friday with four quarterfinal games. There will be two semfinals on Saturday and the championship on Monday. The winner will advance to the NCAA Elite 8 in San Antonio, March 20-23.

Washburn led the entire second half but the Lady Hornets cut it to six three times, the last at the 2:08 mark. The Lady Blues then made nine of their final 10 free throw attempts to secure the victory, their second over ESU in the finals. They improved to 7-0 in championship games played in Municipal Auditorium and swept the regular season and tournament titles for the sixth time since they joined the MIAA in 1990-91.

Ebonie Williams followed her all-MIAA player of the year award with an all-tournament team MVP honor. She scored 24 points Sunday with a 9 of 10 performance from the free throw line. Five of those makes came in the last two minutes. She finished the tournament averaging 18.0 points a game and she shot 44 percent from 3-point range.

Cassie Lombardino and Stevi Schultz also earned all-tournament honors. Lombardino, who scored 19 points in each of the first two tournament games, had 13 in the final. She was 4 of 5 from the field and 5 of 6 from the free throw line. Schultz finished the game with 11 points and averaged 12.0 points and 6.0 rebounds in the tournament.

Schultz moved to 16th in Washburn scoring history, now with 1,051 points.

Dana Elliott, starting for the second straight game, hasd eight points and a team-high seven rebounds. Laura Kinderknecht led Washburn with six assists.

The Lady Blues shot 48 percent in the first half while ESU shot just 27 percent. The Lady Hornets led the first six minutes of the game and then there were three lead changes and three ties before the Lady Blues took a 19-16 lead at the 7:57 mark on a 3-pointer from Schultz. Washburn held the lead the rest of the way after that.

The Lady Hornets outscored Washburn by two points and shot 52 percent while Washburn shot 39 percent. The Lady Blues made up the difference by making 12 of 15 free throws while ESU made just 2 of 2.