Lady Tigers top Noxon on senior night

Beware the Lady Tigers.

The win one, lose one record from the final week of this rebuilding season, left them with the Western 14C conference’s number three basketball seed heading into the District tournament, which begins this Friday (Feb. 16) in Polson.

Saturday night on Senior Night in St. Regis, the Lady Tigers defeated Noxon 38-28 to clinch the third seed. Friday they lost a nail-biter to Two Eagle River’s girls (TER), 43-41.

The significance of that loss? Those two teams appear to be a first round pairing for the District tourney. And they split their two games against each other in the regular season.

Win that opening round and who knows?

St. Regis opened the Saturday night home game with a smothering defense that stymied Noxon, forcing several bad pass turnovers as the Lady Tigers built an 11-3 lead after the first eight minutes of play.

Noxon, behind the play of 5-10 senior forward Meagan Swanson, sliced one point off that lead, leaving St. Regis with a 19-12 halftime lead.

The Lady Tigers dynamic duo guard combo of 5-0 junior Shylah Dalka and 5-4 sophomore Shannon Todd, each dialed in three-pointers in the second quarter and Dalka scored four crucial points in the third, helping the home girls outscore Noxon 9-3, giving them a 28-15 lead going into the final quarter.

Swanson then scored 11 of her game-high 16 points to keep the Lady Devils in striking distance of the lead, but they could not catch the Lady Tigers and senior post Ameyla Jensen, who was playing her last home game for St. Regis. The Lady Devils managed to clip three points off the St. Regis lead, but it was too little, too late for Noxon.

Dalka led St. Regis with 10 points, while Jensen scored eight, including two crucial in the paint buckets that helped deflate Noxon’s rally dreams.

Todd added seven for St. Regis.

The win left St. Regis with a 3-5 conference record and a 5-7 overall season mark.

Noxon closed out the regular season with a 1-7 mark in 14C play, their only league win was over TER last week.

As of Sunday, the District brackets had not been released, but the schedule is no doubt affected by the decision by Alberton before the season began to suspend girls basketball due to injuries from Fall sports and low turnout.

Friday night the Lady Tigers, who beat Noxon twice during the regular season and TER once, traveled to Pablo to take on the Lady Eagles. The home team held serve in the first quarter, outscoring St. Regis 9-7 in what had the makings of a down to the wire game.

St. Regis outscored TER 8-7 in the second quarter, sending the two teams into the halftime break with the Lady Eagles ahead, 16-15.

The Lady Tigers staged a mini-rally and emerged from the third quarter with a 28-26 lead heading into the final quarter.

But TER took its game to another level over the final minutes of play, out-pointing St. Regis 18-13, and holding on for the two-point win.

Jodessa McGreevey led all scorers with 14 points for the victors.

Emma Gillette paced St. Regis with 10 points, while teammate Lilly Sansom added eight for the Lady Tigers.

St. Regis won the first regular season game between the two teams, 51-45 last month in Pablo.