Pony boys ready for tough games against Class A and Class B Eagles

Sitting in the middle of the conference pack, the third-place Havre High boys basketball team has spent most of the week preparing for one of its two games this weekend.

Tonight, the Central A Blue Ponies (3-3, 5-9) will face the nonconference District 1B Fairfield Eagles in Fairfield. It would be a nice game to win, but the Ponies are putting a lot of their focus on the weekend’s conference matchup with the Lewistown Golden Eagles. The Ponies will host the fourth-place Golden Eagles Saturday night at 5 at the Havre High Gymnasium in Havre.

In the first meeting of the season, the Ponies defeated the Golden Eagles 55-49 in Lewistown.

But after getting off to a slow start, Lewistown has been playing much better as of late. Last weekend, the Golden Eagles lost to a talented Laurel program by just two points. Saturday, the Golden Eagles found a way to defeat the Class B Malta Mustangs. But a win would be big for the Ponies, meaning Havre could finish no worse than third, and keeping the hopes of a second-place finish alive. A loss would mean third place would be a best case scenario, with a risk of finishing in fourth depending on how the rest of the regular season pans out.

“They have a couple of talented shooters,” Havre High head coach Curt Leeds said. “But they have really limited their turnovers, and I think that has really helped them. It might be a cat-and-mouse game, we will press them to see if we can cause some turnovers, but if they can beat our press. We will just sit back in our zone, look and get after them in that way.”

Defense has been strong at times for Havre, and it is also much-improved since facing Lewistown last.

Leeds implemented a 1-2-2 zone not long before the first meeting. The Ponies are running that zone look much better at this point in the season, but will also throw some other looks at the Golden Eagles. Now is a good time to also mix in some 2-3 looks, hopefully getting under the Golden Eagles’ skin, as well as forcing turnovers and keeping Dylan Stenseth, James Derheim, Jessey Perry, and Logan Wilcox out of a groove.

Havre’s top scorers, Dane Warp and Kade Rismon, can expect to see plenty of man-to-man looks from Lewistown. The Golden Eagles also tried to completely eliminate Warps’ presence, and if they do that again, shooters like Brian Smith, Nate Rismon, and Nate Korb need to be ready to pick up the slack.

But Fairfield on the road tonight won’t be an easy matchup either, and the Ponies haven’t spent much time preparing for the solid Class B program.

However, Havre is preparing to face a tough zone defense. And in what they have worked on for tonight’s road game, the Ponies have worked on some new offensive looks to counter that defense. Coach Leeds also said they have stressed rebounding, something that should also help prepare them for Saturday’s game against Lewistown.

The Blue Pony defense is also confident they can really hinder Fairfield’s offensive efforts with their zone. Fairfield runs a flex offense, and coach Leeds didn’t seem worried about it being something his team couldn’t handle. But, overall, the Ponies just want to play well, win or lose, and make sure they can earn a much more important home conference win on Saturday.

“We want to show that we can be more athletic than them,” Leeds said. “And more than anything, we just want to play well and be ready for our game against Lewistown.”

Tonight, the Ponies will face Fairfield on the road at 6:30. Saturday, the Ponies will host Lewistown at 5 p.m. at the Havre High gymnasium. Saturday is Havre’s final home game and the Ponies will honor their three seniors before the contest.