money DISTRICT 8C TOURNAMENT: Geer, Outlaws celebrate hard-fought district title
If not for a little requirement known as a Commercial Drivers' License, Brody Geer may have driven the team bus back to Winifred after Saturday's District 8C boys' basketball championship game.
After all, he did practically everything else during Roy-Winifred's 37-35 barnburner of a win over Belt at Bill Swarthout Fieldhouse.
Follow me, now. During those 32 minutes, Brody Geer:
Led his team in scoring with 16 points;
Shot a 3-pointer from beyond the mid-court stripe to end the first half and give the Outlaws some major momentum going into the second;
After Belt's Reese Paulson missed both ends of a two-shot foul with two seconds left, Geer grabbed the final rebound; and,
Let out a primal scream that could be heard above the final buzzer, the crowd noise inside the Fieldhouse, and every locomotive horn at the BNSF Railway enginehouse across the river.
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Otherwise, nothing out of the ordinary happened. It was just your typical, run of the mill, District 8C Tournament game.
Right.
Here's the Cliff's Notes version of what happens now: Roy-Winifred, Belt and Winnett-Grass Range will all advance to next week's Northern C Comibned Divisionals at Pacific Steel and Recycling Arena at Montana ExpoPark.
WGR (not the Buffalo, N.Y., radio station), will take on Sunburst's North Toole County Refiners in a battle of three-seeds Wednesday when the tournament kicks off at 4, with the winner playing the top team from District 9, Chester-Joplin-Inverness, Thursday at 5:30 p.m.;
Roy-Winifred goes up against 9C runner-up Big Sandy Thursday morning at 9:30 a.m.; and,
The Huskies and another second seed in the 10C's Simms Tigers will meet Thursday at 4 p.m.
Geer, a 6-1 senior, had just four points when he made the shot that turned the game around with a shot from behind the 10-second line as the horn sounded to end the first half, bringing the Outlaws within a basket at 18-16.
He added another trey in the fourth quarter to give him nine in the second half.
He sealed the win with two seconds left, grabbing a rebound as Paulson, Belt's 6-1 sophomore point guard, missed both ends of the double-bonus foul, hoping a Huskie teammate could grab an offensive board and get a putback to send the game into an extra four-minute session.
"We just beat a high-caliber team," Geer said. "It gives us some momentum going into divisionals now, and for sure some confidence.
"A physical and defensive game. I'm just proud of my boys. They hustled."
His head coach, Dylan Udelhoven, said this road started when Geer was an eighth-grader, playing on the varsity.
"He's been on the team for five years, played as an eighth grader," Udelhoven confirmed. "He's a smart basketball player, works hard ... he made the plays that we needed."
Udelhoven also noted that this particular win was even more special, given Geer's status as a senior.
""We've lost to Belt in this game in the last two years, so it's nice to finally get a win on them," the coach said. "(Belt's) a great team, they play solid basketball, and I'm just glad that things went our way tonight."
Belt head coach Kyle Paulson knew his team took the Outlaws to task to entire game, leading 8-4 after eight minutes, by two at the half, and 24-23 after three.
"We had our chances," Coach Paulson said. "I would have liked to have seen us do a little better at the free throw line (12-for-26, including 6-for-15 in the final quarter), but every coach bemoans free throws. There was other things that happened during the course of the game.
"I have to tip my cap to them, I thought they did a terrific job rebounding down on their end, and they used their length and their zone to really bother us and make things difficult (for us) offensively."
Blake Donsbach added 11 points for the Outlaws. Reese Paulson led the Huskies with 12 markers, hitting three triples, and Bridger Vogl added 11.
RAMS 68, MINERS 46 (3RD)
Sophomore Brady Bantz had three trifectas and led all scorers with 24 points while Winnett-Grass Range's 6-6 senior Walker Doman added 23 as the Rams led virtually from wire-to-wire to end Centerville's campaign in the third-place game.
Doman had nine points in the first eight minutes as the Rams jumped out on top 18-11, while Bantz added six of his 15 first half points in the second stanza as WGR increased their lead to 33-24.
Keegan Klasner, Centerville's 6-3 junior, hit three triples to lead the Miners in a losing effort with 23 points.
The Rams will face the Sunburst Refiners in the Northern C opener Wednesday at 4 at Pacific Steel and Recycling Arena.
This article originally appeared on Great Falls Tribune: Montana high school basketball: Outlaws beat Belt for district title
