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Havre's Tre Gary dribbles the ball against Lewistown at Armory Gymnasium Tuesday night. Despite a strong first half from the Blue Ponies, Lewistown came back to win, 70-50, to stay undefeated on the season.
On Tuesday night at Armory Gymnasium, it looked like the Havre High boys basketball team had the undefeated Lewistown Golden Eagles on the ropes. The Blue Ponies got off to a strong start as they had a 35-28 lead late in the first half.
However, the Eagles showed why they were undefeated this season as they came back in the third quarter to take a 51-45 lead. Then in the fourth quarter, they pulled away to defeat the Ponies 70-50. While the Ponies could not win the game, HHS head coach Walynn Burgess believes the Ponies played well against the Eagles.
"I just love the way we battled," Burgess said. "There's nothing to hang our heads on. That's a really good team."
The Ponies played well in the first quarter as they jumped out to a 15-7 lead. After the Eagles went on a run to cut the deficit to 15-10, Xavier Butler made a basket at the very end of the quarter to give Havre a 17-10 lead.
The Ponies and Eagles started the second quarter by exchanging baskets. With a 19-14 lead, Butler and Crawford Terry scored to stretch Havre's lead to 23-14 early in the quarter. Burgess believes the Ponies were sharing the ball well to build their lead in the first half.
"We were just moving the ball. It's really hard for them when they have to guard all five of us and we're moving the ball like we did," Burgess said. "Defensively, we were really locked in on the game plan. We stuck to what was going to get us there and we did a good job."
The Eagles kept pace with a couple buckets, but the Ponies continued to play well. Tre Gary and Carter Spangler made another pair of buckets to stretch the lead to 27-19 halfway through the quarter.
The Eagles came back and cut Havre's lead to 31-28. Again, the Ponies responded with buckets from Gary and Spangler to make it a 35-28 game with about two minutes left in the half.
Over the last few minutes of the half, the Eagles went on a 7-1 run. Several different players got in on the action for Lewistown, including Royce Robinson with a bucket in the closing moments to cut Havre's lead to 36-35 heading into halftime.
The Ponies started the second half with free throws from Butler and a basket from Gary to push the lead to 40-35. However, the Eagles continued to claw their way back as they tied the game, 44-44, late in the quarter. Fischer Brown got rolling for the Eagles with five points during this stretch.
Brown then made back-to-back baskets and a free throw to give Lewistown a 49-44 lead after trailing for most of the game. After a Havre free throw, Brody Jenness scored to give Lewistown a 51-45 lead heading to the fourth.
The Eagles carried their momentum into the fourth as they slowly began to pull away. The Ponies tried to retake control, but the closest they could make the game down the stretch was 55-48 with about six minutes left. After that point, the Eagles continued to roll to pull away for the win.
"There's a lot of good athletes out on that floor and they'll keep coming at you," Burgess said about the Eagles' surge in the second half. "I felt like we let it get away from us over the last eight or nine minutes and we were just doing weird things that we just weren't doing earlier."
Brown finished the game with 23 points for the Eagles while Jenness recorded 12 points in the win. Butler led the Ponies with 15 points while Gary scored 11 in the losing effort.
With the loss, the Ponies dropped to 4-3 in the Northeast A and 9-5 overall. While this was a tough loss, Burgess believes the Ponies are continuing to grow as they hope to be the best team they can be when the postseason rolls around in a couple weeks.
"I truly believe in the last three or four games, we've been taking steps in the right direction," Burgess said. "We're taking the right steps in the right direction to have that chance at the end of the year to be playing in a state tournament and I think the boys are really starting to focus on that."
The HHS boys basketball team will next play this Friday on the road against Miles City.
Lewistown 70, Havre 50
LEW - 10 25 16 19 - 70
HAV - 17 19 9 5 - 50
LEW - Fischer Brown 23, Brody Jenness 12, Royce Robinson 9, Gage Norslien 9, Maxx Ray 8, Matthew Golik 6, Trajan Sparks 2, Kieran Netburn 1.
HAV - Xavier Butler 15, Tre Gary 11, Crawford Terry 9, Carter Spangler 6, Shane Patacsil 4, Kash Keller 3, Griffin Terry 2.
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