District 9C basketball continued on Friday from the Havre High Blue Pony Corral. Bright and early, the girls’ action continued with the No. 6 North Star Knights scoring a win in a loser-out contest over No. 7 Hays-Lodgepole, (45-30).
Then it was on to boys’ loser-out action as the No. 4 Fort Benton Longhorns outlasting the No. 6 Big Sandy Pioneers, (66-52). That would be followed by No. 3 Turner over No. 5 North Star, (59-36). That would set up the boys’ consolation game. More on that later.
The 9C tournament continued with girls’ semifinal action. In the first contest, the No. 1 Chester-Joplin-Inverness Lady Hawks secured a (54-31) victory over No. 5 Turner. Brynn Kammerzell scored 22 points in the CJI dub. The second semifinal was the first lower seed to beat the higher seed in either the boys’ or girls’ tournament as No. 3 Fort Benton outscored No. 2 Big Sandy, (40-28). Ang Reiner was the only Lady Longhorn in double-figures with 11 points.
After the girls’ play wrapped up for the day, the final boys’ games were played in the 2024 District 9C basketball tournament and the consolation game was a close one for three quarters. The No. 4 Fort Benton Longhorns beat the No. 3 Turner Tornadoes, (67-53). Truman Giese put on a show for Fort Benton, dropping 20 in the victory. The Longhorns will be the No. 3 seed out of the 9C in next week’s divisional play.
The final game of the night saw the undefeated No. 1 Box Elder Bear boys win the tournament title, (88-65) over No. 2 Chester-Joplin-Inverness. The Bears used an 18-point first quarter from Tuarie Stiffarm-Rosette and a 17-point third quarter from Tracen Jilot to blow out the competition.
Box Elder will go into next week’s divisional tournament as the No. 1 seed out of the 9C and face the No. 3 seed out of District 8C, while CJI maintains its No. 2 seed out of 9C and take on the 8C No. 2 seed.
Four more games on the air will close out the District 9C girls’ basketball tournament on KOJM-610AM and HiLineToday.com.
