Cats fall short in divisional tournament

After a stellar regular season, the Columbia Falls boys were stunned in the Western A divisional tourney last week in Whitefish and didn’t qualify for state.

The Wildcats opened the tourney with a 64-51 win over Butte Central, but then lost to Dillon 62-41 in the semifinals Friday night.

That set up a loser-out game against Ronan Saturday morning. The Wildcats led it through most of the game, but Ronan battled back late in the fourth and with about 16 seconds left, put in the game winning shot to go up by a point.

The Cats had two chances to score. A three-pointer by Reggie Sapa went in and out and the put-back jumper by Grady Hutton was off the mark as time expired, giving the Chiefs the win and ending the Wildcats’ state tourney bid.

Ronan outscored the Cats 22-13 in the fourth quarter, but the Cats led the whole game up until the last shot.

“We just could shake away from that 6 to 8-point lead,” coach Chris Finberg said.  “We just couldn’t extend it ... You hate to lose the way we did ... It was a good year. Hate the way it ended.”

Against Butte Central the Cats were led by Jory Hill with 17. Sapa had 14.

“I thought Jory played really well the whole tourney,” Finberg said. “For a sophomore point guard, he was really good.”

In the Dillon game, the Cats hung with the Beavers, which were bigger at nearly every position, in the first quarter, down by just five. But Bjorn Pedersen, who has led the team in scoring all year, ran into foul trouble and Cats had a tough time with him on the bench. Dillon outscored the Cats 15-6 in the second and never looked back.

Pedersen and Sapa had 13 in the loss.

Against Ronan, Easton Brooks led the team with 11.

Columbia Falls ends the season at 16-5. While the tourney didn’t go their way, the Cats have a lot of returning talent in Pedersen, Hill, Nico Young and Brooks as well as several junior varsity players. The future looks bright. Open gyms start soon.