Sunday Recap 2-10-19

For some the end of the 2018/2019 winter sport season reached it’s end as two of the three winter sports had their state tournaments, the official sign that the end is near for winter sports fans.

Wrestling
The annual All-Class MHSA state wrestling tournament went down at Billings MetraPark Friday and Saturday with all three Missoula AA schools sending wrestlers to compete. Big Sky lead all Missoula schools on the mat as the Eagles would finish fourth overall with 143 points, with Hunter Meinzen taking the top spot on the podium at 145. Sentinel finished 12th out of 14 teams with a score of 62 points, and the Hellgate Knights filled in the last place spot with a score of 18 points between two wrestlers.

Swimming
It was another impressive performance by the Hellgate Knight boys and girls swim teams took their sixth consecutive state swimming title over the weekend to close out the 2018/2019 swim season. The girls where able to hold off the Bozeman who fell short of knocking off the Lady Knights by 60 points, but on the boys side of the pool it was not even close as Hellgate outscored second place CMR by just over 100 points.

Sentinel put up a good fight on the girls side as the Lady Spartans finished third with 193 points, and the boys finished seventh overall with 103 points. Big Sky battled hard in the pool but where not able to crack the top ten as the girls finished 12th with 43 points, and the boys came in 19th place with a team total 10 points.

Girls Basketball
Starting with our local Class C school in the Lady Eagles of Valley Christian who finished their regular season with a hard fought game against Superior on Friday, but had their final game of the regular season postponed due to weather conditions, so they will look forward to the District Tournament in Frenchtown this weekend.

Loyola had a big week to finish out the regular season as the Breakers would face one of the top teams in all of high school basketball in the state of Montana in Arlee. Tuesdays game against Arlee proved to be a test before the Breakers finished the season off in Anaconda on Friday to roll their way into the postseason.

In Class AA girls basketball the Hellgate Lady Knights had their biggest test of the regular season as they would face two of the top three teams in the state and came away with lessons learned through a pair of loses to Helena and Capital. The Lady Spartans would also take on the Helena schools and have the same fate as Hellgate with back to back loses. Big Sky had a pair of games against the Kalispell schools and though they left nothing on the court the week ended 0-2.

Boys Basketball
Hellgate boys basketball is the topic of all discussion as the Knights are playing the best basketball since the Tres Tinkle era, with a tight game against Helena on Thursday and nail bitter against Capital on Saturday. Sentinel faced Helena and Capital as well as the Knights but not fare as well, knocking off Capital on Thursday and fell to Helena on Saturday. Big Sky did a tour of the Kalispell schools this past week and it ended with a big win over both Flathead and Glacier.

The Loyola boys had a tough week to finish out the regular season as they would have a heartbreaking loss against the Arlee Warriors, but bounced back with a win back on Friday night with a win over conference rival Anaconda Copperheads to finish out the regular season. A trip to Superior proved to be the final game of the season regular for the Valley Christian Eagles as their game against Helena Christian on Saturday would be canceled due to travel conditions, and now the Eagles will prepare for the district tournament next weekend.