Schweikert, C-Falls boys rout Bulldogs

WHITEFISH — The Columbia Falls Wildcats pulled away from rival Whitefish to win 63-28 in a clash of Western A foes Thursday night.

Cody Schweikert was the Wildcats leading scorer with 15 points. He played closer for Columbia Falls down the stretch by tallying 10 second half points and dominating the paint on both sides of the ball.

Things were evenly matched entering the second frame after a Mason Kelch buzzer beater knotted things at 12-12 to end the first.

“Whitefish played very well in that first quarter,” Wildcats head coach Chris Finberg said. “They did a lot of good things, hats off to Whitefish….they caused us some problems.”.

The Wildcats responded with a 14-2 run in the second quarter to make things 26-14 entering the half. Columbia Falls kept their foot on the gas and pushed the lead to 35-17 with 2:31 to play in the third after a pair of Schweikert free throws.

“Our guys regrouped at halftime and we played a much better second half,” Finberg added.

Alihn Anderson nailed a 3-pointer as time expired in the third quarter to beat the buzzer and make things 40-20 in favor of the Wildcats.

Anderson finished with 13 and was a key factor for Columbia Falls from the opening tip. He scored the game's first seven points by knocking down back-to-back 3-pointers and hitting a free throw to propel a 7-0 lead out of the gate for the Wildcats. The team hit six total threes.

“We preach we want to play inside out, we want to let our bigs go to work…a few threes today we got weren’t inside out but we were able to get open threes and we were able to knock some down,” Finberg said of his team’s success from deep.

It was a full team effort with 10 different players scoring for Columbia Falls.

Kelch was the leading scorer for Whitefish with 12 points. Dane Hunt was second with eight for the Bulldogs.

Columbia Falls 12 14 14 23 63

Whitefish 12 2 6 8 28

COLUMBIA FALLS — Cody Schweikert 15, Alihn Anderson 13, Reggie Sapa 6, Jace Hill 6, Hunter Goodman 5, Mark Robison 5, Bryce Dunham 4, Dayne Tu 4, Silas Ypma 3, Hunter Hoerner 2.

WHITEFISH — Mason Kelch 12, Dane Hunt 8, Ryan Conklin 5, Mason Genovese 2, CJ Thew 1.