Lady Vikings district champs
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PABLO – The Charlo Lady Vikings basketball team earned the program’s first District 14C Championship since 2011 on Saturday evening, winning a decisive 37-17 victory over the St. Regis Lady Tigers at the Joe McDonald Health and Fitness Center on the Salish Kootenai College campus in Pablo.
“It has been a good year for the girls, but this weekend the girls played like they had nothing to lose,” Lady Vikings head coach Bret Thompson said.
The Lady Vikings set the tone for the night by grabbing a 12-0 lead in the first quarter.
St. Regis shaved the deficit to 19-10 heading into the locker room at the half, but the Lady Vikings broke the game open with a 14-1 burst in the third quarter and held a 20-point advantage over the final eight minutes.
The third seed Lady Vikings made their way through the brackets to the championship game by defeating Hot Springs 55-23 on Thursday afternoon.
The win against Hot Spring set up the Friday afternoon semifinal match up with cross-county rival Arlee.
In previous Charlo-Arlee matchups this season, the Scarlets prevailed in both games 46-29 and 49-42.
But this time, the third was the charm for the Lady Vikings as they handily defeated the Scarlets 47-24.
“We got three great wins against a tough district, but the Arlee game was definitely a highlight,” Thompson said. “We got good scoring from a lot of different girls (when they needed to score) but it was their defense that I was most impressed with, unselfish, tough, and in your face defense.”
Kaitlin Cox led the way offensively for the Lady Vikings by scoring game highs in each of the three games. Cox scored 12 points against Hot Springs, 14 points against Arlee and in the championship game, she netted 10 points.
“We are excited to get this opportunity to keep playing,” Thompson said.
Charlo travels to Hamilton on Thursday to play its Western C Divisional first round match up against the Seeley-Swan Lady Blackhawks at 10:30 a.m. at the Dale Berry Court.
The Arlee Scarlets easily won their first match up of the tournament by routing the Two Eagle River Lady Eagles 65-3 on Thursday.
After dropping the game on Friday against Charlo, the Scarlets out hustled Noxon in a loser out game on Saturday morning to advance to Saturday’s afternoon consolation game against Hot Springs.
Alyssia Vanderburg scored a game-high 26 to lead the Scarlets to a 54-28 third place victory over Hot Springs.
With Charlo’s win over St. Regis, the Scarlets playoff hopes hang in the balance with a challenge game against St. Regis set to be played Monday evening. (Editor’s Note: Due to early editorial deadlines Monday’s game results will be reported on next week.)
Unfortunately, the district tournament appearance for the Two Eagle River Lady Eagles was very short lived. The Lady Eagles fell 65-3 on Thursday to Arlee and on Friday, the Lady Eagles were eliminated by Hot Springs 54-18 in a loser out game.
Justina Big Beaver led the Lady Eagles in points with a two-game combined total of eight points.
