The Dogs of ‘91

Editor's note: This story ran in two parts, in the July 18-19 editions of the Daily Inter Lake.

Part 1:

In late February of 1991, the Missoulian sent a young(ish) reporter to cover the Western A Divisional boys basketball tournament at Flathead High School.

It promised to be a good one: Columbia Falls, Stevensville and Whitefish had all come in with 14 regular-season wins, and it was a toss-up as to who might win it.

In the end, after an overtime semifinal win over Columbia Falls, Whitefish beat Stevensville to win the divisional. Before overflow crowds at the venerable gym, veteran(ish) coach Julio Delgado had the Bulldogs running, pressing and quite possibly making their own luck (you’ll see).

So of course when it came to picking a state tournament to cover the following week, the reporter went to State B, because no Western team had won State A since Whitefish won its first title in 1970 (with Delgado playing the point).

Whitefish then won the State A championship, while Darby finished fourth in B.

This was regrettable.

The Bulldogs blended a couple talented transfers — Damian Campbell from California and Luca Grassilli, an exchange student from Italy — with a strong returning cast and, partly because no Bulldog was over 6-foot-2, shocked the state.

Thirty years later we talked with most of the principals in Whitefish’s landmark championship, a 20-4 campaign built around tough practices, tougher defense, a Columbia Falls expat, an upset of Butte Central at the Butte Civic Center and that epic Western A semifinal.

Delgado: Here was the deal with that team. We had seven kids that averaged 10 points or better. The distribution of wealth was good. We had great balance and we were really good at defense and sharing the wealth. We were never the star system, anyway. We just had a lot of great athletes.

Mike Bauer: My brother (Pat) is two years older than me. We moved to Whitefish in 1979, and my first memory was going to football games and the Bulldogs winning the state championship. Then when I was a sophomore my brother was the quarterback. We were going to win a state championship together, we just didn’t know how. Then we got beat in the football semifinals (by Colstrip in 1990), and we were heartbroken: We can’t win one in football, how the hell are we going to win one in basketball?

Delgado: I was a disciple of that Bobby Knight method of madness. We really concentrated on defense and on offense, getting good percentage shots. Those little things, we paid a lot of attention to.

Kyle Bell: We lost our very first game of the year, at a tournament in Columbia Falls. I think it was Bonners Ferry, and they were pretty good. But I didn’t think that was very good.

Bell was another transfer: He’d spent two years at Columbia Falls and then, partly because he had played baseball for the Glacier Twins (who Delgado managed), switched schools before his junior year, doubling his dose of a demanding coach.

Bell: He was sort of the reason I came, because he was the basketball coach and I’d already dealt with him in baseball. I was like, I need that. I need him to yell at me and push me.

Pat Bauer: We did something called the 17: You start on the sideline, run to the other sideline, that’s one. You went to 17, and usually we had to do it under a minute. And if one person didn’t get under a minute, it didn’t count. It was great conditioning. It got us in really good shape.

Bell: But we ran more for him in baseball than anything. The one I remember was in baseball, in Canada. We didn’t play well and Julio pulls the bus over. “Get out,” he says. We’re in this field and we’re five miles from the border, and it’s 11. He said, “Border closes at midnight. I suggest you be there.” And the bus takes off. So, we started running.

Pat Bauer: That would be true. Julio ran with us, though. He always ran with us, our distance runs.

Delgado: Every time we did extra conditioning, I did it with them. All we had to do was win one game up in Lethbridge and we win the conference. Instead, we drop two. But I miss-gauged the distance. I thought we were three and a half miles. It was seven miles, all uphill. I about died before I got there.

Eric Goodman, KCFW sportscaster: I don’t know if I watched a full basketball game that year, but I was at practice all the time. If they ran gassers, he ran gassers. He never made them do anything he wouldn’t do.

Pat Gulick: He WAS Bobby Knight. He was always ready to go. He'd talk to his players, say this is what we need out of you tonight. There was always a pregame speech, not that I remember any of them. He was truthful — one of Julio’s best qualities was his truthfulness. Sometimes it hurt.

Gulick, a future Montana State football player, played the pivot. Pat Bauer, Bell, Grassilli and Lance Hudson filled out the starting lineup. Campbell, Mike Bauer and Andy Cripe were the main reserves. Grassilli came from Bologna, Italy (pop. 400,000) and had played a lot of basketball.

Delgado: Lucas Grassilli. He was the front of our 1-2-1-1 press. He scored 10 points a game on layups. Couldn’t shoot a lick and he couldn’t spell defense, but by the end he was good at both. Six-2, long arms, did a great job at the head of the full-court press.

Grassilli (via email): When I looked (Whitefish) up on the Atlas, and from the pictures Ray and Jerrie Boksich had sent me, it looked like a nice little place in a beautiful surrounding. I was happy and enthusiastic about being there, and I tried to “melt in” as soon as possible, keeping a low profile, working hard on perfecting the language, on school, basketball, on this new life.

Mike Bauer: At first he didn’t really realize what he was getting into, as far as how hard practices were and Julio and this small town atmosphere.

Grassilli: When the opportunity came to spend a year in the US, it was my small hope to be able to attend a few practices during the year, just to feel what it was like to play US basketball, and not just watch college or the NBA on satellite TV.

After the Bonners Ferry game the Bulldogs reeled off 11 straight wins, including their first win over Flathead, 50-44 at home, in 18 years, and a 79-73 win over Columbia Falls in which Hudson hit six free throws in the final 1:30 and finished with 21 points.

Pat Bauer: Beating Flathead was a pretty cool moment. We had given them good games, like my previous year when I was a junior. The years before that, with Graver Johnson, Pfenningson, they were so close. Whitefish had never beat Flathead as far as anyone could remember.

Mike Bauer: Somehow with Julio’s magic, we pulled it off.

Hudson: I do think of that time. My father brings it up most of the time. He just loved watching those Bulldogs — he was a huge fan.

Gulick: He knew what could do, and you didn’t always like him for it, because it was a lot of work. But I’d say every one of us looks back on those days and is thankful we had him as a coach.

Pat Bauer: We were in top condition to get up and down the floor. We had basically a lay-up drill: You took the ball out of the net, and the goal was to throw an overhand pass so they could catch the ball and lay it up without dribbling. It was challenging, but it was fun . I was pretty good at it and so was Kyle. Lance Hudson and Luca Grassilli were great at early releasing and Kyle or I would hit them right in stride. We got a lot of points that way.

Columbia Falls ended the streak with a 56-52 overtime win, the first of three losses in six games for the Bulldogs. Surrounding a school record-setting 114-62 win over Eureka were Ls at Flathead (58-48; Mark Gilman had 24 points and 17 boards for the Braves) and an 89-84 home loss to Stevensville (the Yellowjackets hit 12 of 14 3-pointers). Stevi owned the tie-breaker and had top seed into divisionals, setting up a Whitefish-Columbia Falls semifinal if they won their openers. Which is what happened.

Part 2:

The Whitefish Bulldogs had lost a home game to Stevensville late in the regular season, and the Yellowjackets ended up with the No. 1 seed into the Western A Divisional. That put the Bulldogs and their stone’s-throw rival, the Columbia Falls Wildcats, on the same side of the bracket.

When Whitefish beat first-round opponent Hamilton 66-58, and Columbia Falls thumped Ronan 66-50 in the first round, a semifinal rematch was set.

The Green and Gold had talent and balance: Kyle Bell, the former Wildcat, averaged 14.8 points; Pat Bauer checked in at 13.5, with Lance Hudson (12.7) and Damian Campbell (12.5) weren’t far behind and Italian exchange student Luca Grassilli (8.8), Andy Cripe (7.8) and Pat Gulick (7.5) were capable of big nights.

Nobody was over 6-foot-2, but they pressed and defended like crazy.

The Dogs and Cats had split two regular-season meetings, each winning narrowly on their home floor. Now they squared off in Flathead High’s jam-packed gym knowing whoever lost would be in trouble: Just two teams advanced to State.

Whitefish built a 43-35 lead before Columbia Falls surged ahead, 50-49. Bell missed a free throw that would have tied it in the final minute, and Whitefish fouled the Wildcats’ Brian White with seven seconds left in regulation. White made his first free throw, missed his second and Hudson got off a desperation floater with the game in the balance.

Delgado: If we lose that game, who knows, we probably would never have made state..

Pat Bauer: I remember that game was back and forth all the way. There was a point when I thought we were kind of in control. I think we were up seven or eight points in the fourth, and I remember Mike Caldwell hit three 3-pointers in a row.

Mike Caldwell: We hit five in five trips. That’s how we got back into it. We probably shouldn’t have been in position to win that game, and all of a sudden we were. Then the impossible happened, with Bell.

Pat Bauer: I’m sitting there at the free throw box, thinking, “If he makes this we’re going to have to make a 3-pointer.” I was thinking, Holy ----, because if we were third we wouldn’t be going to state, because no way was Stevensville going to beat Columbia Falls. “Great, I don’t get to go to State.” All of that goes through my head in like, 5 seconds. Then the rest is a blur.

Delgado: I’ve got this on video. Kyle Bell got the rebound, threw an outlet pass and Hudson shot it and it missed. Out of nowhere, Kyle tips the ball with his left hand, his off hand, as the buzzer goes off and the ball goes in to tie the game.

Bell: That was pretty big for me, getting that shot and beating those guys.

Caldwell: I’ve watched it several times. They made video highlights for us, and I remember watching it and rewinding it and watching it again and wondering, “How in the heck.” Then I remember the oppressive noise after he made it.

Whitefish outscored the Cats 3-1 in overtime and won 53-51. This was sweet for Bell, who’d had a tough time with Wildcat fans following his transfer.

Bell: I couldn’t go into town for like a year. Back then I was a pioneer. These days kids transfer every month and it’s no big deal (laughs).

Caldwell: I was good friends with those guys. Kyle had transferred, and that was the same time I’d moved in from Cut Bank. I remember everyone being so angry at Kyle and I was like, (laughs) “I don’t see what the big deal is.”

Bell: We lost to them at Columbia Falls that season, and that’s when Julio went crazy. We come back to the locker room at halftime, which was under the stands, and I had loogies and ketchup all over me. Julio goes, “People spit on you?” he went freaking nuts. I was like, “All right, this guy has my back.”

Delgado: Well, they were spitting on him! I was going to go back out there and get after these people.

Caldwell: That game we beat them in overtime, Kyle was just abused by the student body. It was hard to take. It was embarrassing. But talk about redemption. To tip that in was amazing. Then we had to turn around and root for our rivals.

Behind three players in double figures, led by Pat Bauer’s 13, Whitefish beat Stevi 62-56 for the title. That set up Columbia Falls for a challenge game, which it won. Stevensville, the top seed, missed state for the 15th straight year; Columbia Falls was going for the fifth straight season and Whitefish for the fourth time in six years. The Bulldogs, though, drew Butte Central and 6-foot-7 Brian Boedecker on more or less its home court: A packed Civic Center.

Delgado: I watched the Butte Central coach, Mark Beckman, on the Butte TV station the night before. He didn’t give us any respect at all.

Gulick: That was a fun game. I don’t think they’d seen that physical of a defense all year. We maybe caught them off guard.

Bell: We didn’t know too much about them. We knew they were huge. Coach told us they were probably the best team in the state. Havre was top-ranked, but he thought Butte was better.

Delgado: They had Boedecker. I told Pat Gulick — and Pat never scored, who was basically a banger inside — if you hold Boedecker under 10 points, we can win this game. Well Pat held him to nine points and seven rebounds, and he had 17 and nine, and that was the difference.

Gulick: Mike Bauer did well against him, too. It was certainly nice to have both of us on him, because he was a force. I was just a short 6-foot-2 guy. I just had to play hard. That’s what Julio’s teams had to do every year.

Bell: I remember warming up and every single guy for them was dunking. But I wasn’t really worried. Size didn’t matter to us. We played Flathead and they were huge. I didn’t worry about them too much. We just played.

The final was 68-62. Whitefish never trailed against Glendive in the semifinals, scoring a 54-49 win behind Lance Hudson’s 18 points. Columbia Falls went 0-2 at state; meanwhile the Civic Center stands had taken on a decisively green hue by the championship game. The Bulldogs worked their press and transition for a 79-66 victory over Laurel. Bell had 25 points, Pat Bauer 20 and Whitefish put the game away with a 23-point fourth quarter.

Bell: Once we got Laurel I was like, ‘Whoa, we’re going to be the favorite.”

Pat Bauer: Havre had Tom Reynolds and Bill Rice. They were even taller than Butte Central, and that was going to be a very tough matchup for us. But then Laurel took them out and we matched up much better with Laurel. I don’t remember a ton about it. It was a bit of a blur at the time.

Gulick: Did Laurel have stars? Because we didn't. I certainly wasn’t. But other teams like Butte and Glendive all had guys you had to stop. I just remember us being very similar teams.

Through it all, Delgado kept up his unfiltered ways: When Beckman was quoted saying the officiating hadn’t been tight enough in the first round, Delgado called it an insult; after beating Laurel he claimed nobody gave the Bulldogs a chance. After the tournament, fulfilling a preseason promise, Delgado shaved his trademark moustache. Still, who else knew? The Bulldogs won many divisional crowns under Delgado, and went unbeaten in 1991-92… until losing to Butte Central in the State A semifinals. The 1991 state championship has become a landmark.

Delgado: We lose in the semis the next year and that (Sean) Walsh kid couldn’t miss. We should have won two in a row, I thought. But that’s high school athletics.

Hudson: It was just a year where it was our year. We just worked real well together. And Julio, he knew his players individually and emotionally. He knew how to push the buttons of a kid to where he performed really well and didn’t shut down. Yelling at me about what I did wrong never worked. He would get mad, I could tell, but he would never yell at me. It wasn’t rigid.

Goodman: I say this with all due respect to every kid on that team, but they would not have won a state championship without Julio on the bench. They were physical, well-conditioned, and they wore teams down. I don’t know how many clips I had of them stealing an inbounds pass on the baseline and scoring. They just outworked people.

Bell: Pretty much it was outwork your person. After the game he’d say, “You’re not good. You think you’re good? You scored 23 points and your guy scored 17. That’s six points.” You knew who you were going against before the game, and they kept track.

Mike Bauer: I was in the process of planning a big reunion last February, and then the pandemic hit. My brother has his 30-year class reunion this summer. Everybody just wants to hang out with Julio. That’s pretty much it.

Grassilli: We were not the best team in the state (to start the season), we didn’t have too much size, we didn’t have top players, or unreal athletes, but quickly the WE took over, in all areas, on and off the court. I think this is what I remember most, more than the dreaded 17s at the end of practice.

Pat Bauer: I dreamt it with Kyle: At the time we were 14-4, and we said, “We’re going to win divisionals, and we’re going to win three games at state, and we’ll be 20-4 and we’ll win state for the first time in 20 years.” It was a wild dream, but we knew there was a chance. It’s fun how it all came together like it did.