Whitefish outguns Ronan in shootout
WHITEFISH - In a wildly-entertaining game between two of Northwestern A's hottest squads, the Whitefish High School boys basketball team slowed its tempo late, stayed cool at the foul line, and beat Ronan on Friday, 65-63.
Leading 57-55 with 2 minutes, 46 seconds left in the game, Whitefish switched to a 1-4 spread offense, forcing Ronan to either watch precious time slip away or foul the Bulldogs and send them to the foul line. The Bulldogs converted 13 of 15 free-throw attempts, including eight of 10 in the final frame, to win for the sixth time in seven Northwestern A games, improving to 6-5 in conference play and 7-10 overall.
Sophomore guard Aaron Tkachyk led Whitefish with 18 points, including 12 in the first half. But Luke Fennelly scored all 10 of his points in the second half and went 6-for-6 from the charity stripe in the fourth quarter.
"He really stuck the dagger in them at the end and didn't give them an opportunity to get close because he was knocking down those free throws," said Whitefish coach Julio Delgado.
Delgado said Fennelly's clutch free throws typify the heady senior point guard.
"He's been the starting point guard here since he's been a sophomore, so he's got the most minutes of experience of anybody on the ballclub," Delgado said. "Nobody else played hardly any minutes last year at the varsity level. He's been there, he's been through the wars. He's got to be the guy that leads us, and he's done that on a number of occasions this year."
Sophomore guard Colt Idol scored 14 points for the Bulldogs, followed by senior post Jamie Clogg, who notched 10 points and two blocks before fouling out with 3:10 left in the game.
"The improvement of Jamie Clogg has been huge," Delgado said. "Jamie has come a long way. He only started playing basketball as an eighth grader … and now he's really found his stride. He feels good about himself and I think that's the key."
The Bulldogs needed every one of their points to hold off a crisp-passing Ronan team with speed and energy to burn. Trailing 34-29 at halftime, Whitefish began the third quarter with a 16-1 run, taking a 10-point lead, only to see Ronan battle back to a 55-53 fourth-quarter advantage.
Senior forward Cameron Barber led Ronan with 17 points, but junior guard Moss Tanner wowed fans of both teams, scoring 15 points while dishing beautiful passes all night.
"They're two of the best players in the conference," said Ronan coach John Hollow of Barber and Tanner.
Ronan's Nolan Harris scored 12 points on four treys.
The Chiefs tallied 19 assists and turned the ball over just 12 times. They finish their regular season with a 6-6 conference record and 9-9 overall mark.
"They were 0-19 last year, so it's a credit to the kids," Hollow said. "They busted their tails all summer and really did a lot of things that aren't fun to do in the offseason. But it shows out on the court. We're a whole lot different team and a whole lot better team than we were last year."
Whitefish began the game playing press defense, but Ronan committed just six turnovers in the first half and scored 20 points in the second quarter.
"We're not a pressing team," Delgado said. "The reason we press is to get our intensity level up and get into the game, into the flow. We don't have the depth to be able to press all game long like Columbia Falls. We can't do that because our legs are going to be absolutely shot by the fourth quarter, so we have to pick our spots."
Whitefish picked its spots perfectly. The Bulldogs backed out of their press for most of the second half, but Delgado called it back on during a timeout with about three minutes to play.
"We went to that 1-2-1-1 full-court press and we got two real quick turnovers that turned into points, and that gave us that cushion that we needed," Delgado said. "Then we could go to our stack delay, then we could go to our spread. So the press did hurt them more at the end than it did at the beginning."
Hollow said Ronan usually relies on tough defense to win games, but the Chiefs' defense wasn't as sharp as its offense Friday - especially during Whitefish's 16-1 run.
"Defensively we weren't sliding," Hollow said. "We were playing pretty good on-ball defense, we were making guys beat us off the dribble like we wanted to do. We weren't getting very good help-side rotation, though, and they got about six or eight points off easy layups against us."
Delgado said Whitefish continues to improve since its 0-8 start, thanks largely to its balanced attack and the maturation of young players such as Tkachyk.
"Aaron Tkachyk, early in the season, had some confidence problems, and about mid-season he hit his stride and he started playing with confidence," Delgado said. "Now he's no longer playing like a sophomore."
Sophomore forward David FauntLeRoy scored four points for the Bulldogs while doing plenty of dirty work.
"He's just a raw-boned, tough kid," Delgado said.
Ronan is off until the Northwestern A divisional tournament at Whitefish, which begins Feb. 22.
"It's a good experience to come up here because we're going to be playing the divisional tournament in two weeks," Hollow said. "I'm not really fond of moral victories, but I'm happy where we're at going in. We have a lot of improvement still in the next two weeks."
Whitefish concludes its regular season by entertaining Bigfork tonight at 6:30. Delgado said beating Ronan was important for the Bulldogs, who were blown out by Columbia Falls their last time on the floor.
"I think it meant a lot for us to come out and win a tough game like tonight, especially when we took a hit to our confidence like we did against Columbia Falls," Delgado said.
Ronan 14 20 13 16 - 63
Whitefish 20 9 20 16 - 65
RONAN (9-9, 6-6) - Moss Tanner 4 7-9 15, Mike Fisher 1 0-0 3, Jordan St. Clair 3 2-2 9, Gene Adams 3 0-0 7, Nolan Harris 4 0-0 12, Cameron Barber 6 5-9 17. Totals 21 14-20 63.
WHITEFISH (7-10, 6-5) - Aaron Tkachyk 7 3-3 18, Luke Fennelly 2 6-6 10, Byron Whitcomb 1 2-2 5, Colt Idol 6 2-3 14, Jamie Clogg 6 0-1 12, Jake Smith 1 0-0 2, David FauntLeRoy 2 0-0 4. Totals 25 13-15 65.
3-point goals - Ron. 7 (Harris 4, Adams 1, Fisher 1, St. Clair 1), WF 2 (Tkackyk 1, Whitcomb 1). Rebounds - Ron. 19, WF 24. Assists - Ron. 19, WF 15. Steals - Ron. 4, WF 6. Blocks - Ron. NA, WF 2. Turnovers - Ron. 12, WF 11. Total fouls - Ron. 17, WF 18. Fouled out - Ron. 0, WF 1 (Clogg).