Lady Mavs take second

The Lady Mavericks were able to punch their ticket to their second straight Eastern C Divisional tournament by placing as the second seed in the 3C District Tourney last Saturday.

The team will see their first action of the Eastern C against the Froid/ Medicine Lake Redhawks tonight at 7:00 p.m. at Wolf Point High School.

The Redhawks were the first seed in the 2C District but the team lost 49-47 to the Mon-Dak Thunder in the tournament’s semi-final round, shaking up the Eastern C Divisional.

Having earned a first round bye in the 3C Tournament held in Glasgow last weekend, the team was able to overcome the Frazer Lady Bearcubs in the semi-finals, but lost the 3C championship game to the Scobey Lady Spartans on Saturday night at Glasgow High School.

“Froid-Lake is solid,” Lady Mavericks Head Coach Amber Erickson said. “They have good guards, they have size, two or three six footers, and so size-wise they are going to match up with us.”

With only two teams going to state from the Eastern C Divisional, the Lady Mavericks have their work cut out for them, with Mon-Dak and Bainville-Circle placed on the same side of the bracket. On the other side will be Scobey, Savage, Lustre and Plentywood.

“We’re going to have to put together three great games in this divisional tournament,” Coach Erickson said. “We are going to need it to compete for sure.”

To reach the 3C championship, the Lady Mavs defeated Frazer 59-50 last Friday night. North Country was led by a 30 point, 17 rebound effort from Mickayla Johnson. Ten of those points came in the fourth quarter.

“It was a typically helter-skelter, fast paced, lot of stuff going on game,” Coach Erickson said. “They made strong runs at us in the fourth quarter and we really had to step up and get a few defensive stops.”

Jada Sudbrack added 14 points, 15 rebounds and 6 assists. Casity Boucher added four points, 10 rebounds.

The teams had a total of 26 offensive rebounds and 16 assists.

The Mavericks outscored Frazer 29-18 in the first half, which was big enough gap for the Mavericks to hold onto despite going 14-of-35 from the charity stripe through the game. Still the Bearcubs put the pressure on during the second half.

“That’s the thing about Frazer, they don’t quit,” Coach Erickson said. “They are going to full-court press you helter-skelter and it doesn’t take them long to make up points so no lead is really that safe with that team.”

The Lady Bearcubs came within two possessions of the Mavericks’ lead.

“They got within four before we were finally able to take control and kind of not settle for anything other than layups and free throws,” Coach Erickson said. “Once we decided that, we were able to get a few more easy shots and make enough free throws to seal the game.”

Coach Erickson knew the significance of getting the win against Frazer with many other hungry teams hoping to extend their season.

“That was a big game for us,” Coach Erickson said. “I didn’t tell the kids before but that one was the biggest game we’ve played this season so far.”

She went on to say that had they lost they would’ve faced a “tough Lustre team in a consolation game.”

“We played great team ball that day against Frazer,” Coach Erickson said. “Our bigs were working together really well.”

In their 55-26 loss to Scobey in the championship, the Mavericks were led by Sudbrack who had 11 points and Kayleigh Cummings who had seven points.

Though the first quarter ended 14-11 in favor of the Spartans, the Scobey defense clamped down on the Lady Mavericks, keeping the team within single digit scoring in the second, third and fourth quarters.

“Scobey came out full guns, full throttle and they played a great game,” Coach Erickson said. “They shot the ball really well and defensively got after us. They were just a better team than us last Saturday.”