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News you can use
Chester-Joplin-Inverness' Madeline Woods, right, tries to go by a Great Falls Central defender during a Northern C girls first-round game Wednesday night in Great Falls. The Mustangs beat the Hawks.
Chinook's Kelsey Mathon, right, handles the ball during the Sugarbeeters' Northern C game against the Belt Huskies Wednesday night in Great Falls. Chinook lost and will play a loser-out game Friday afternoon.
Chinbook's Abigail Ellison, left, brings the ball up against Belt Wednesday night in Great Falls.
CJI's Kristina Dahinden, left, goes by a GFCC defender during Wednesday night's Northern C girls game in Great Falls.
GREAT FALLS — Sometimes, a team is just too good. And that was the case of the Chinook Sugarbeeters in their Northern C divisional first-round game Wednesday night inside the Four Seasons Arena.
The Belt Huskies are just too good.
Belt ripped off 16 unanswered points in the first quarter against the Beeters, the District 9C runner-up, in what ended up being a 65-24 Belt victory. The win pushed Belt, the defending Northern C champs, into Friday night’s semifinal game, while Beeters will play in a loser-out game Friday afternoon.
Chinook took a 2-0 lead on a Abigail Ellison layup, but from there, the Huskies went on a 16-0, sparked by full-court pressure and layups from Dani Urick and Kerstyn Pimperton. By the time the first-quarter onslaught was over, the Huskies led 18-5, and while Chinook battled hard, the Beeters could never figure out the Huskies’ up-tempo defense, and fast-paced offense. The result was a Belt 33-13 lead at intermission.
For the game, Chinook was forced into 22 turnovers, while on the other end, the Beeters shot just 21 percent and made a mere eight field goals. Kourtney Hanson came off the bench to lead the Beeters with nine points, while Brooke Nicholson added seven. The Beeters await the winner of tonight’s loser-out game between Valier and Chester-Joplin-Inverness, while the Huskies, who got 18 points from Urick, will play 10C champion Great Falls Central in the semis Friday night.
Hawks grounded on day one
The Chester-Joplin-Inverness Hawks made a great run in the District 9C tournament last week, and ended up earning a berth at the Northern C Divisional girls tournament. Unfortunately, the Great Falls Central Mustangs got in the way of the Hawks’ momentum.
Wednesday night, in the opening round of the Northern C, the 10C champion Mustangs trampled the Hawks, 48-22 inside the Four Seasons Arena in Great Falls, dropping CJI into the loser-out bracket.
The Hawks, a young team, had shot the ball extremely well last week at the 9C tourney, but against a senior-laden Mustang squad, the Hawks just couldn’t get going from the outside, and GFCC’s ability to defend turned out to be the biggest difference.
“Give them (Mustangs) a lot of credit,” CJI head coach Jerry Kulpas said. “They came out and defended really well. They were aggressive, And every pass we made, they were right on top of us. We just couldn’t get anything going, and they (Mustangs) deserve a lot of credit for that. They are a very good, very disciplined team.”
After falling behind 7-2, the Hawks finally found some light when Korrin Harmon drilled a deep 3-pointer to close GFCC’s lead to 14-9 at the end of the first period. But, the Mustangs’ defense smothered CJI from there, while turnovers led to easy transition layups for GFCC. And between the 4:40 mark of the first half and the 2:05 mark of the third, the Hawks went without a field goal, while the Mustangs led 24-15 at intermission, and 48-21 at the end of the third en route to the win which pushed them into Friday night’s semifinals against defending state champion.
The Mustangs got 12 points form Bryn Anderson, while they held the Hawks to just 22 percent shooting and forced them into 20 turnovers. Harmon paced the Hawks, who will play Valier tonight at 8:30 p.m. in a loser-out game, with 11 points, while Kristina Dahinden added five.
“Same thing happened to us in Havre,” Kulpas said about losing a first-round game. “So hopefully we can come back and give ourselves a chance to get to Saturday night. That’s our goal. But we have to come out and play our game.”
The Northern C girls tournament continued this morning with unbeaten Box Elder looking to advance to the semifinals against Roy-Winifred.
Belt 65, Chinook 24
Belt 18 15 21 11 - 65
Chinook 5 8 7 4 - 24
Belt -- Bailey Cooper 1 0-0 3, Sara Anderson 3 0-2 6, Addy Martin 5 0-0 12, Olivia McCafferty 1 0-0 3, Dani Urick 8 2-3 18, Kerstyn Pimperton 3 2-2 9, Jordan Swanson 1 1-2 3, Brianna Wall 2 0-0 6, Kassie Hoyer 2 1-2 5, Makayla Murphy 0 0-1 0. Totals: 26 6-12.
Chinook -- Kourtney Hanson 4 0-2 8, Abigail Ellison 1 0-0 2, Brooke Nicholson 2 2-2 7, Sierra Swank 1 1-5 3, Kelsey Mathon 0 2-2 2, Nicole McCracken 1 0-0 2. Totals: 9 5-11.
Fouls - Belt 14, CHI 16. 3-pointers -- Cooper, Martin 2, McCafferty, Pimperton, Wall 2, Nicholson.
Great Falls Central 48, CJI 22
CJI 9 6 2 5 – 22
GFC 14 10 10 14 – 48
CJI – Korrin Harmon 5 0-0 11, Madeline Wood 2 0-2 4, Kristina Dahinden 0 5-10 5, Adriana Jamison 1 0-0 2. Totals: 8 5-12.
Great Falls Central – Melissa Nickol 1 0-0 2, Kenadee Depner 3 3-4 9, Mackenzie Fauque 2 1-2 5, Maddie Wingerter 1 1-2 4, Bryn Anderson 5 2-3 12, Katie Wilson 4 0-0 10, Hanna Tarum 1 4-8 6. Totals: 17 11-19.
Fouls – CJI 11, GFC 14. 3-pointers – Harmon, Wingerter, Wilson 2.
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