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News you can use
Havre High's Kyndall Keller, left, goes by a Malta defender during a game just two weeks ago at the HHS gymnasium in Havre. The Blue Ponies fell to the M-Ettes that night and will try and turn the tables when they meet Malta again tonight on the M-Ettes' home floor. Havre will also play its final home game Saturday night against Rocky Boy.
Recently, the Havre High girls basketball team found itself in a bit of a slump. After winning 10 of 11 games to start the season, HHS lost three straight and one of the teams that beat the Blue Ponies was Malta.
The loss to the M-Ettes was the second of the three in a row and tonight, Havre will look for some for payback on the road against the defending Class B state champions. Tip-off time is set for 7 p.m.
"Yeah we are really looking forward to it," HHS head coach Dustin Kraske said. "Why wouldn't you be excited for that? We get to go on the road and play a great team. It's a great opportunity for us to keep growing as a basketball team."
Havre, which is 11-4 overall and 7-0 in the Central A, lost to the M-Ettes 44-35 in the first meeting between the two teams. Defensively, the Ponies did an admirable job of containing Malta star Sophia Stiles, as well as Jada Nicholson, the M-Ettes other big gun. The problem was that the Ponies couldn't score enough to keep pace.
In fact, Malta held the Ponies scoreless for more than 10 minutes in the game. Then, when Havre made a run late, it was too far behind for it to matter. However, scoring slumps like the one against Malta have also happened against CMR and Fairfield. The latter held HHS scoreless for the entire third quarter last Saturday, which Kraske said is something that can't continue.
"We just have to come out with energy," Kraske said. "And we have to have the belief that we are a good basketball team."
In Saturday's win over Lewistown, a game that Ponies needed badly, its two star players Naomi Terry and Kyndall Keller delivered. Terry, a senior, scored 20 points and notched five steals. Keller, a freshman, scored 15 points and also impacted the game with rebounds and on the defensive end.
The two players, which average close to 30 points a game between the two of them, will need big performances if Havre is going to have a chance to upset Malta. The Ponies will also need solid contributions from others such as Danielle Wallace, Marca Herron, Kaylee Nystrom, Kristen Nash and Kylie Verploegen.
"Right now, we are just trying to keep moving forward and getting better," Kraske said. "We won the league, which puts us in the best position we could be in right now and leading up to divisionals, we just want to keep getting better and better."
The Ponies and M-Ettes will square off tonight in Malta with tip-off time set for 7.
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