Flathead cagers in a playoff mood
Flathead's Joe Pistorese tosses up a shot against the defending arm of Glacier's Shay Smithwick-Hann while Grahm Schmaltz looks on during a game on February 5 at Glacier High School. The two teams begin their playoff season's at home this evening, with Glacier hosting Helena at 6 p.m. and Flathead hosting Missoula Hellgate at 7:30 p.m.
One is home, the other goes on the road.
Such is life for Flathead High School’s basketball programs this week.
The Flathead boys (11-8 overall and 7-5 league), by virtue of their No. 3 seed in Western AA, will entertain Missoula Hellgate (5-15 and 2-10), seeded No. 6, tonight at 7:30.
The Flathead girls (4-15 and 1-11), the No. 7 seed, travel to Missoula to take on No. 2 seed Sentinel (17-3 and 9-3) at 7 p.m.
The winners of both playoff games advance to the Class AA state tournament in Billings March 11-13.
The Flathead boys have dropped playoff games the last two years to Glacier and Missoula Big Sky. The Braves’ last state tournament appearance was in 2007.
The Flathead girls lost a playoff game last year in Missoula to Sentinel 58-50. The Bravettes advanced to state in 2008.
Boys
Flathead vs. Missoula Hellgate
The Braves swept the regular-season series with Hellgate, 56-44 at home and 46-44 last Saturday in Missoula.
In both games, free throws played a deciding factor.
Flathead went 23-for-34 from the charity stripe in the home victory, then in the second meeting was 15-for-20.
“They play a real physical style of basketball,” Flathead coach Fred Febach said of Hellgate.
“They have some good sized kids.”
Jesse Ginn is Hellgate’s force inside. He’s 6-foot-5, 260 pounds.
Rebounding will also be a big part of this matchup. Flathead won the board wars in the first two games, although it was close.
“They will be a challenge,” Febach said.
“Fortunately for us, we were able to score enough (both times) and hold them off.”
Febach said Hellgate does an excellent job running its half-court offense. In an effort to counter that, “what we’d like to do is play a tempo a little quicker if we can,” he said.
“It’s a difficult matchup for us, a difficult matchup for them as well.”
Flathead’s faced Hellgate both times this season after huge victories over rival Glacier.
“It was tough to turnaround play the next day after such an emotional game the night before,” Febach said.
“That’s why I give my kids a great deal of credit. They came back both times and beat Hellgate. That says a lot about the character of the kids, the chemistry on this basketball team.”
Flathead is led offensively by Karl Ingram, who is averaging 14 points per game. Tanner Salois and George Sherwood are next at 10 each.
Ingram also leads the Braves in rebounding at 6.5 per game. Jeremy Grosswiler is also averaging 6.5 and Sherwood between four and five.
Salois led the way with 15 points in the first meeting with Hellgate. Ingram was tops with 12 in the final game.
“Let’s go play, see what happens,” Febach said.
“We’re gonna give it our best shot. At this point of the season, you don’t do things different. You play with confidence and with poise.”
Girls
Flathead vs.
Missoula Sentinel
Two completely different games.
D.J. Reinhardt and Bryn Hasquet helped Sentinel hammer Flathead the first time around 65-39 in early January. Last month at FHS, Sentinel squeezed out a 40-34 victory.
“Second time around we just played a little different defense,” Flathead coach Karly Tait said.
“We went zone the whole game. We were able to control their shooters a little better than the first time.
“We had better ball movement in our zone offense,” she added.
“Our overall game was a lot better.”
Reinhardt scored 18 points and Hasquet 15 in the first meeting. Hasquet had 19 points while Reinhardt finished with just seven in Game 2.
“Out of all the teams that finished in the top four (of Western AA), Sentinel is the one team we kind of wanted to play again,” Tait said.
“We feel we matchup the best with them.”
Flathead will have a size advantage in the middle with 6-3 junior center Danika Johnson. She tallied 17 points in the first game with Sentinel, but was limited to seven in the second.
“Danika is probably going to have a good game inside (for us to be successful),” Tait said.
“They don’t have a big girl there to match up with us.”
Johnson is averaging 10 points and 10 rebounds per game.
Flathead will also need some scoring help from Tess Brenneman and Brittany Earnest. Brenneman has scored eight and six points versus Sentinel, while Earnest didn’t score in the first meeting, but had 10 points in the second one.
“Everybody is capable of contributing,” Tait said.
“We’ve found when we’ve had success, we need help from everybody and our bench so it’s not on those three all the time who have led us most of the season.”