Clark Fork Mountain Cats head into districts with high hopes

Districts for 13C basketball will be held this week in Hamilton from Feb. 17 through Feb. 20. The Clark Fork Mountain Cats boys will go into the tournament in third place. They are tied with Philipsburg, who is the number two seed. Missoula’s Valley Christian will go into the tournament with one loss.

On Feb. 17, the Cats will play the winner of the Seeley-Lincoln game at 7 p.m. Seeley is favored to win against Lincoln. If the Cats beat Seeley or Lincoln in Wednesday’s game, they move up the bracket to the next game. The top two teams automatically go to divisionals, which will be held in Hamilton Feb. 25 through 28.

The Lady Mountain Cats go into districts in fourth place. They will play Darby Feb. 18 at 1:45 p.m. Seeley is in first, Drummond is in second, Philipsburg is third. If the Lady Cats win, they’ll play again on Friday at 6 p.m. They will play the winner of the Seeley-Lincoln game. Seeley is favored to win.

Alberton player, Montanna Baughman said she’s never gone into districts without being in last place. The same is true for the Alberton boys team. Last year, both teams started with eight players, but were down to five going into districts and both ranked at the bottom.

Alberton junior, Nick Turnbull, who’s been playing varsity ball since he was a freshman, said that this year with the Superior co-op has been awesome,

“It’s been such an incredible experience, and hopefully we’ll play in the championship game on Saturday,” he said.

Girls coach, Jeff Schultz said that the team is improving everyday and that the girls are finding their identity offensively.

“We’re becoming a dangerous team,” said Schultz, “we have a very good chance at districts.”

He said that last year the girls took third place. In that situation, they have to play the number 3 seeded 14C team. From there they play a challenge game against the fourth place 11/12C team. Last year Superior girls played Gardiner and lost. Gardiner went on to take State.

Mountain Cats boys coach, Eric Johnson, said that his game plan “is to win.”

“We’re definitely contenders,” said Johnson, “the boys have really done a good job in the last eight games. They’ve only lost two and that was again Arlee and Valley Christian. The boys are doing really well and keep getting better.”