Wolfpack nips Wildkats
Glacier senior Brooke Watkins (25) pushes her way toward the basket around Columbia Falls senior Kelsey DeWit (40) during their game on Friday. Glacier won 48-45.
“Oh, darn it, Rach!”
Glacier coach Kris Salonen admits having that thought.
Twenty-four seconds left in the game, trailing the visiting Columbia Falls Wildkats by one point on Friday night, Glacier’s Rachel Cutler drove from the left side, put up a nice little shot... and missed.
No worries, though.
The ball went out of bounds to Glacier, Salonen called timeout — and Cutler got another chance.
She made up for that miss seconds later when she drove the middle of the lane and put up a little floater that put Glacier on top.
Sydney Sharaf’s free throws sealed the deal as the Wolfpack (4-5) came away with a 48-45 nonconference win over Columbia Falls (6-5).
Cutler finished with 20 points to lead all scorers.
“She came back and that’s all you ask is for them to never give up, just keep going,” Salonen said of Cutler’s first miss.
“That’s the game of basketball. You want them to finish and do the right thing, but (Cutler) did so many other good things. You never want to dwell on one play.
“I think I told everybody ... ‘if Rachel comes out tonight, that’s going to be the difference in the game.’ For Rachel to get some confidence and step up — and she did. She’s an offensive threat. If you don’t close out on her, she can shoot it. But she’s also so quick going hard to the rack. She was definitely the key,” Salonen said.
“(Cutler) does a beautiful job with that little running floater right inside the key,” agreed Columbia Falls coach Dan Fairbank.
“Today was a huge step for these kids, for confidence and believing they can have some success,” Salonen said.
“The last couple weeks we’ve competed. We played well against Polson. Big Sky, we were there, but we couldn’t finish the game. We’re learning. We’re going to keep learning,” she said.
As for the Wildkats, they’re going to go watch game film and try to figure out just what went wrong.
Columbia Falls led by as many as seven points, but was done in by 20-plus turnovers, an inability to break the Glacier press and 3-for-8 shooting at the free throw line.
“The only good thing we can get out of this is that it was a really good game for us to understand how to win games at the end,” Fairbank said.
“We had several chances to win it and couldn’t quite put it away,” he said.
“Credit Glacier because they never quit. We’re 10 times bigger than they are and we jumped on them a few times. They just would not stop,” Fairbank said.
Columbia Falls led 41-37 with 5:22 left in the game. But it was nip-and-tuck all the way. Glacier led 44-43 with 1:31 to go. Ashli Fairbank’s short jumper with 1:15 to go put the Wildkats back on top.
The turnovers — eight in the fourth quarter alone — came back to bite the Wildkats.
“We kind of freeze,” Fairbank said of the Wildkat press-breaker.
“I have to yell exactly where to throw the ball — they need to be more like Tony Romo and see the field a little bit. They just kind of get one person locked in and if that person is covered, they don’t know what to do,” he explained.
“We did a better job once we started reversing the ball,” he said.
“But really, we need to take better care of the ball.
“Every time we moved the ball offensively, we got layup after layup. We weren’t hitting them tonight, which is pretty unusual for Kayla DeWit not to make most of those shots she was getting. I felt like she was getting beat up pretty bad on almost every single one. But that’s something she has to get used to. She has to get those little bunnies in,” Fairbank said.
Kayla DeWit led Columbia Falls with 15 points. Older sister Kelsey contributed nine points and Dani Gilley had 10.
Brooke Watkins added 11 points to the Glacier effort.
The Wolfpack plays host at 2 p.m. today to the Libby Loggers, while Columbia Falls plays host to Class B Missoula Loyola at 5 p.m.
Columbia Falls 14 10 12 9 — 45
Glacier 9 13 14 12 — 48
Columbia Falls — Dani Gilley 5 0-2 10, Ashli Fairbank 3 0-1 6, Kayla DeWit 7 1-2 15, Brooke Cady 1 0-0 2, Shay Grilley 1 1-2 3, Kelsey DeWit 4 1-1 9. Totals 21 3-8 45.
Glacier — Rachel Cutler 8 0-1 20, Paige Latimer 0 2-2 2, Sydney Sharaf 1 2-2 4, Baylee Quay 0 1-4 1, Patty Hughes 2 1-2 5, Brooke Watkins 2 5-6 11, Ashlee Waggener 2 3-4 5. Totals 15 14-21 48.
3-point goals: Columbia Falls 0, Glacier 4 (Cutler 4). Total fouls: Columbia Falls 13, Glacier 13. Fouled out: None.