Havre wrestling competes at Mining City Duals

In its first road trip of the season, the Havre High wrestling team wrestled at the Jim Street Mining City Duals in Butte this past weekend. The Blue Ponies went 2-3 in the dual tournament, but HHS head coach Beau LaSalle liked how his wrestlers performed in their second weekend of the season.

“I thought we wrestled all right,” LaSalle said. “I thought the kids competed well on Saturday and we just got to get some little things ironed out, but we’re young and we’re growing every week so we’re happy with the performance.”

The Ponies started the tournament with a dual against CMR. It was a close dual, but CMR won, 34-24, to hand the Ponies a loss to start the weekend. The Ponies rebounded in their next dual as they defeated Browning 66-12.

The Ponies then ran into Kalispell Flathead and lost, 61-6, in their dual. Kalispell went on to win the dual tournament.

A loss to that program is nothing for the Ponies to hang their head about, LaSalle said.

“I think Kalispell is probably the best team in the state right now in all classes,” LaSalle said. “They’re super deep and they got a good team going.”

In their next dual, the Ponies responded with a 40-36 win over Columbia Falls. LaSalle believes Columbia Falls is one of the best programs out west, so it was a solid win for the Ponies. However, the Ponies’ weekend came to an end with a 46-39 loss to Helena Capital in another tight dual.

While the Ponies faced adversity over the weekend, LaSalle believes it was a good experience for a young wrestling squad. If they can learn from these duals, it should make them better going forward.

“We’ve got to continue to get better every day,” LaSalle said. “If you just keep improving day by day, then by the end of the year, it adds up to be a big change.”

The HHS wrestling team will next compete at the CMR Holiday Classic in Great Falls this Friday and Saturday.