By Derek Hendrickson

The Butte Central Maroons got their second win in 21 hours, leading all the way in a much easier than expected 72-39 victory over the Stevensville Yellowjackets Saturday afternoon at the Maroon Activity Center.

The win was also another revenge game much like Friday night against Anaconda.  The Maroons narrowly lost in the Bitterroot 44-43 in December but jumped all over the Yellowjackets early and cruised to the win.

Butte Central Head Coach Brodie Kelly was happy about various aspects of his team’s performance, but two stuck out in his mind.

“Overall I was really happy with how we played,” Kelly said. “The two things I like the most is the way we are playing defense together, helping each other out, playing on a string and I also like that our offensive rebounding has been huge since the break.  I don’t know how many second chance points we had tonight but it felt like a lot.”

Central had 10 offensive rebounds for the game and most led to easy put backs or free throws.

Central will look to replicate these types of performances as their upcoming schedule has several more rematches as well as two games against Class AA competition.  The Maroons will play at Hamilton next Saturday and at Dillon on the 31st as well as seeing Belgrade, Corvallis and Livingston for the second time.

The Maroons evened their season record at 6-6 and improved to 2-3 in Southwestern A action.

In this game Central scored the first 10 points of the game and raced out to a 21-5 advantage after one.  Stevensville finally got an inside buck after the quarter was more than half over and never threatened the Maroons.

The Maroon defense was stifling early as they forced more turnovers, six, than Stevi had shots, five, in the first quarter.

For the second night in a row the Maroons outscored their opponent in every quarter and left many fans wondering what the difference could have been in the past month to result in the 35-point swing.

Kelly was asked about this and said “I feel like we are playing defense much better.  I feel like we are playing offense much more cohesively.  Like I said last night guys are starting to gel and find their role.  Guys did a nice job sharing the ball, knowing who we were trying to get shots and where and that’s the big difference, we didn’t score a lot of points in Stevensville.”

Another recurring theme for the new and improved Maroons was a balanced score sheet.  Three players cracked double figures and 8 put in points for Central.

Dan McCloskey led the way with his hot hand from downtown, netting 16 points with 4 coming on three-balls.

Nate McGree had another big game with 14 points and eight rebounds.  Jared Simkins played what might have the best game of his young career with 11 points and four rebounds.

Also cracking the scoresheet were Tanner Kump with 9, Cade Holter with eight, Jason Johnston had 6 and both Matt Simkins and Hunter Hartwick chipped in 4 for the Maroons who had by far their best offensive game of the season.

A big part of the scoring was unselfish play that Coach Kelly referenced, as the Maroons tallied 19 assists.  Many leading to either uncontested layups or wide open looks from behind the arc.  Johnston had 6 from his point guard position and Holter added four dimes, all which seemed to free up a post player for a wide open look.

Kelly talked about his team’s willingness to make the extra pass, saying “There was a lot of good interior passing, a lot of good entries and cuts off of that, I thought our posts did a great job of making an extra pass either a dump off to another post or inside out, sharing the ball or even setting themselves up for an offensive rebound.”

Central was able to get their entire roster several minutes of playing time in the final frame.  In addition to everyone who scored Luke Heaphy, Archie Petritz, Aaron Richards, Tyge Yelenich and Zach Carlson logged court time.

Stevensville was led by their two seniors, James Fry and Dalton Bragg who had 13 and 10 respectively.  The Yellowjackets fell to 3-7 on the season and are now 1-4 in Southwestern Conference play.

Central will look to turn the tables next Saturday on Hamilton, who as of this writing has only one loss on the season, at Dillon.  As the Maroon faithful will recall the last matchup was a tight game at the MAC that saw the Broncs play keep away before hitting a game winner at the buzzer.  Tip off in Hamilton is set for 4 PM.

“We had them on the ropes,” Kelly said about the previous game with the Broncs. “We were up nine in the second half.  It was a dogfight, it was a scrapper but I know they are extremely potent offensively, they are really difficult to guard, we are going to have to play really well to beat them.”

STEVENSVILLE (3-7, 1-4) — Jarod Kingsbury 2 2-2 6, James Fry 5 1-2 13, Dalton Bragg 4 2-4 10, Chase Richards 3 0-1 6, Luis Estrada 0 0-0 0, Colby Meeds 1 0-0 2, IVan Yuzuak 1 0-0 2. Totals 16 5-9 39.
BUTTE CENTRAL (6-6, 2-3) — Sam Johnston 3 0-0 6, Tanner Kump 3 0-0 9, Nate McGree 6 2-2 14, Dan McCloskey 5 2-2 16, Luke Heaphy 0 0-0 0, Cade Holter 4 0-0 8, Matt Simkins 2 0-0 4, Jared Simkins 4 3-4 11, Archie Petritz 0 0-0 0, Aaron Richards 0 0-0 0, Hunter Hartwick 1 2-2 4, Zach Carlson 0 0-0 0, Tyge Yelenich 0 0-0 0. Totals 28 9-10 72.
Stevensville         5        14        9        11 — 39
Butte Central      21       19       15       17 — 72
3-point goals — BC 7 (McCloskey 4, Kump 3), Stevensville 2 (Fry 2). Fouls — BC 12, Stevensville 12. Fouled out — Kingsbury. Technicals — none.  Turnovers — BC 12, Stevensville 13.  Rebounds — BC 30 (McGree 8), Stevensville 19 (Richards 8). Blocks — BC 5 (M Simkins 3, McGree 2), Stevensville 1(Kingsbury).  Assists — BC 19 (Johnston 6, Holter 4), Stevensville 6 (Fry 3).

Hamilton 61, Missoula Sentinel 51

Sentinel …10 8 14 19 – 51

Hamilton …14 17 9 21 – 61

Sentinel – Mitch Roberts 17, Brayden Danzinger 4, Sam Beighle 13, Ethan Jones 5, Will Mytty 6, Griffin Line 6. Totals 20 6-10 51.

Hamilton – Cam Rothie 9, Ky Burch 6, Hunter Omlid 6, Jayden Taggart 6, Tanner Goligoski 17, Carter Kearus 17. Totals 21 15-19 61.

3-point goals – Roberts 2, Beighle 2, Mytty; Goligoski 3, Kearus. 

BELGRADE 67 BROWNING 47*

BEL TOP SCORERS=LAYMAN=23; FOWLER=16

BROW TOP SCORERS=WHITCOMB=14; AIMSBACH=9

PARK 52 HAVRE 50*

Livingston …17 11 4 20 – 52

Havre …16 13 10 11 – 50

Livingston – J. Waddell 4, B. Peterson 15, M. Rosberg 2, D. Purkett 2, R. Floyd 4, D. Walker 3, J. Ricketts 17, A. Parker 5. Totals 13 23-30 52.

Havre – T. Parsons 11, N. Korb 14, I. Warp 9, B. Personett 2, I. Aageson 13, J. Sedahl 2. Totals 15 16-21 50.

3-point goals – Peterson 2, Ricketts; Parsons 2, Korb, Warp, Aageson. Total fouls – Livingston 18, Havre 19. Fouled out – Aageson.

FERGUS 74 HUNTLEY PROJ 51 

Huntley Project …13 7 22 9 -- 51

Lewistown …16 25 18 15 -- 74

Huntely Project – Breyden Rose 7, Chad Geck 6, Keenan Reynolds 7, Lane Sumner 5, Brad Graves 12, Colton Hudson 8, Bryce Peterson 10. Totals: 20 6-11.

Lewistown – Tanner Trafton 17, Jake Cliaton 5, Eric Knox 6, Andrew Latum 4, Wes Jameson 1, Kale Kynett 5, Jaden Graham 19, Cade Ayos 15. Totals: 29 10-18.

Three point goals – Reynolds 1, Sumner 1, Graves 1, Hudson 2, Knox 2, Graham 3, Ayos 1.

SIDNEY 70 MILES CITY 50*

HARDIN 73 GLENDIVE 30