Senior Night: Pony girls edge Rocky Boy

The Havre High girls basketball team has had some tough battles with Class B opponents in recent weeks. The Blue Ponies got another one on senior night.

Saturday night at the HHS gymnasium, HHS seniors Naomi Terry, Ceyara Plante, RayAn VandenBos and Kristen Nash played their final home game of their careers, and while it was tough, the Blue Ponies sent the seniors out with a 59-51 win over the Rocky Boy Morning Stars.

“Our seniors played great tonight,” Pony head coach Dustin Kraske said. “Naomi had a really good game, Ceyara Plante played really well and did a bunch of different things for us. I thought Kristen Nash was really aggressive posting up and that opened up some things for us, and RayAn had a really solid game with her defense and rebounding. So those for really led us to what was a nice team win.”

It was a total team effort by the Ponies, and they needed everyone because Rocky Boy came out pushing Havre right from the opening tip. Adrienne Gopher and Sean Henry combined for four first-quarter 3-pointers in a fast-paced first eight minutes that also saw Havre’s Kyndall Keller drill two threes and score eight points.

It was more of the same in the second frame. Terry hit her second triple to give Havre the lead back at 17-15, but the Morning Stars got a late three from Rosie Parker, which lifted them to a 27-24 lead.

“Rocky Boy played very well,” Kraske said. “They were shooting it really well in that first half. They did a nice job, and that team, they are going to be a very tough out in their district tournament this week. They played a really good game.”

As well as the Morning Stars played, Havre might have played even better in the first five minutes of the second half. Keller and Plante went back-to-back from downtown to cap an 11-0 run, while Nash and Danielle Wallace got inside buckets which helped push Havre’s lead to 46-36 in a quarter the Ponies outscored the Morning Stars 22-9.

“I thought we were much more aggressive in the second half,” Kraske said. “I thought we rebounded a lot better and, offensively, we just got into a much better flow. Our kids did a really nice job of adjusting in the second half, and I thought we played really well there.”

Havre did indeed. But the Morning Stars didn’t go away without a fight. Gopher opened the fourth with a triple, and Jaylynn Mitchell scored inside to cut Havre’s lead back to six. But Terry answered that spurt with a three to push the lead back to double digits, and Havre’s excellent defense pretty much held the Morning Stars at bay the rest of the way.

Terry hit three of Havre’s six treys and scored 17 points, while fellow senior Plante knocked in a key trey and scored 14. Keller finished with a game-high 19 points for the Ponies, who improved to 12-5 on the season. Rocky Boy, which, now gets set for the District 1B tournament later this week, got 13 points from Mitchell and 12 by Gopher.

Havre, meanwhile, has just one game left before the Eastern A Divisional, which is a mere two weeks away. The Ponies are on the road next Saturday to face Browning on the final night of the regular season.

Havre 59, Rocky Boy 51

Rocky Boy 15 12 9 15 – 51

Havre 14 10 22 13 – 59

Rocky Boy – Shania Patacsil 2, Sean Henry 4, Adrienne Gopher 12, Kristie Parker 2, Rosie Parker 10, Jaylynn Mitchelle 13, Rochelle Pease 8. Totals: 22 2-3.

Havre – Ceyara Plante 14, Kyndall Keller 19, Kaylee Nystrom 3, Naomi Terry 17, Danielle Wallace 4, Kristen Nash 2. Totals: 16 21-31.