Skylights rally to beat Western 44-42

For the first two and a half quarters Friday night against the University of Montana Western, it seemed that the Montana State University-Northern Skylights, couldn't buy a bucket.

But thanks to an outstanding defensive effort, the Skylights hung around in the Frontier Conference semifinal inside the Armory Gymnasium, just long enough for Jacy Thompson to knock down two clutch 3-pointers, the last coming with 13.5 seconds left to give MSU-N the 44-42 win.

Northern will advance to the Frontier Conference championship which will be played Monday night on the road against Lewis and Clark State.

"I am really proud of this team," Northern head coach Chris Mouat said. "This team never gets rattled, if it did, we wouldn't have come back to win tonight.

"Montana Western is a great team," He added. "They did a great job tonight. We had to beat them four times to get to this point and tonight, that took us literally everything we had to get that done."

The Lady Bulldogs opened the game by playing suffocating defense. The two teams each scored 12 points in the first quarter to leave the game tied, but in the second, Western outscored the Skylights 11-2 to take a 23-14 halftime lead.

In the third quarter, after falling behind 31-21, the Skylights went to work. Sierra Richards scored an old-fashioned 3-point play to get MSU-N within seven, then after two triples to end the stanza by Faupel, the Western lead was just 35-32.

That set the stage for Thompson, who scored eight of her 14 points in the fourth quarter. First, she scored a deuce to get Northern within one at 37-36. Then, after the Bulldogs pushed it back to four, Thompson hit a three as the shot-clock expired to get the Skylights within one at 40-39.

The two teams exchanged buckets in the next couple of minutes, but some key defensive stops, teed up Thompson's game-winning 3-pointer, which hit the back of the net with 13.5 left on the clock. A desperation shot at the buzzer missed for Western and that sent Northern to the Frontier Championship game with a 2-point win.

"When I caught the ball, I didn't think about it, I just let it fly," Thompson said.

The junior from Townsend led all scorers in the game with 14 points. Faupel also pitched in with 12 for the Skylights, while Richards had 11.

For more, see Monday's edition of the Havre Daily News.