Bluehawks win two in conference

The Bluehawks earned their first back-to-back conference wins all season by defeating Troy, 49-45, on Friday and Eureka, 56-49, on Saturday.

On Friday, Challis Wilson and Jaron Laws led the District 7-B Bluehawks, scoring 20 and 15 points respectively in the road win.

The Bluehawks entered the locker room trailing 21-23, but exploded in the third, outscoring Troy 17-9 while building a lead they would never relinquish.

“We’ve played a lot of good games in the first half and not come out the second,” Thompson Falls coach Chad Laws said.

A concerted effort on the defensive held the Trojan offense to 30 percent shooting while Thompson Falls capitalized, making good on 41 percent of their field goals.

“They wanted to play us pretty tight on the perimeter and we were able to find some success with our penetration game,” Laws said.

Also contributing for the Bluehawks were Garrett Reinschmidt, who scored eight, A.J. Pavlik with five and Josh Hojem who tallied one.

Trent Cratty netted 23 points to lead all scorers in the loss as his Trojans fell to 4-2 conf., 6-4 ovr..

On Saturday, a second half surge by the Lions was almost enough to push the short-handed Bluehawks to their limit.

Despite missing Sky Hall, who did not travel with the team, Thompson Falls started off strong, leading 11-3 after one quarter and 30-12 at halftime.

Before the game seemed out of reach, however, a head injury to forward A.J. Pavlik, left a hole in the Bluehawks front court that was almost big enough for Eureka to squeeze through.

The Lions took advantage, closing the gap, outscoring Thompson Falls 16-10 and 21-16 over the final two periods.

“I think our defense was a big part of that,” Laws said. “We’re working on contesting shots and focusing on the defensive rebounding portion of that to limit their offensive rebounding and put-backs.”

Reinschmidt led Thompson Falls with 22 points in the win. Wilson scored 20, Laws six and Hojem  and Cody Phillips with four apiece as the Bluehawks improved to (3-4, 6-6).

Bryton Guckenberg led Eureka (3-8, 3-4) with 21 points and Tanner Blankers added 15. Ryan Holder did not play in the loss, as he rested an injured knee.

This week Thompson Falls will host Columbia Falls, on Friday, and Bigfork on Saturday.