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District 3 took it on the chin Monday at Grafton.

District 4 delivered the knockout blow.

Hillsboro, Thompson, Hatton-Northwood and Dakota Prairie all lost in Monday’s opening round of the Region 2 boys basketball tournament at Grafton.

Hatton-Northwood was the No. 1 seed out of District 3. The Thunder were eliminated by Park River, 68-46.

Dakota Prairie, regular season champ and No. 2 seed, was knocked out by North Border, 69-59.

ThomPson was eliminated by Cavalier, 51-48.

Returning to the region after a one-year absence, the Hillsboro Burros were stopped by Grafton, 67-49.

The Grafton Spoilers and Park River Aggies played last night for the region title.

The winner plays in the state Class B tourney next weekend in Fargo.

Hillsboro’s season ended Monday when they fell to Grafton on the Spoilers’ home court.

The Burros finished the 2007-2008 campaign with 14 wins and nine losses.

Grafton, 22-2, advanced to championship game by beating North Border, 77-68, Tuesday. Park River moved one game closer to state with a 72-31 whipping of Cavalier.

The Spoilers withstood a 42 point barrage by North Border in the fourth quarter to win the semi-final match-up.

Hillsboro players and coaches watched the semi-final round from the stands.

“We fought hard to get to the regionals,” acknowledged Burro coach Elliot Rotvold.

“But, we came up against the best team on their home court.”

Playing their last game of high school Burro basketball were seniors Jake Olsen, Brian Smelden and Billy Otto.

“Our three seniors did a good job for us this year,” said Rotvold. “They’ll be missed.”

Otto filled in all season when the Burros were injured. Smelden often was assigned the best shooter on the other team and Olsen played the steady floor game that’s been his trademark since he started seeing playing time as a freshman.

Olsen played much of the second half of the season with a broken hand.

Still, according to his coach, the 6-ft. frontline player had an excellent year.

“His leadership and passing ability were second to none.”

Against Grafton, the Burros sagged in against the Spoilers’ big man, 6-6 Anthony Kliniske, who came into the region averaging 20 points a game.

The Burros held Kliniske to 9 points.

Mike Bartunek pumped in 19 points to spoil the Burros’ game plan. Kameron Collette and Paul Holand each had 13 for Grafton.

“We made the guys shoot who we wanted shooting,” Rotvold explained. They simply made their shots, he added.

The Spoilers’ perimeter player went 4 of 5 from 3-pt. range in the first quarter.

“We eliminated Kliniske’s touches and we took away (Andrew) Wysocki for the most part.”

Collette, Holand and Bartunek, meanwhile, dropped in 34 points. They came into the tourney collectively averaging 15 points a game.

“That was big for them,” conceded Hillsboro’s coach.

“We needed to stay close to have a good chance, but that didn’t happen.”

When the post season started in Class B there were 64 teams playing basketball. Tuesday’s round eliminated 32 teams.

Of the 16 playing last night, eight will survive to play another day.

The eight will take the court at the FargoDome next weekend in Fargo.

Class B basketball will have a new champion as Parshall, the defending state title holder, was beaten Monday night.