MISSOULA — Class AA high school basketball in Missoula has plenty of fresh faces in the coaching ranks this winter.
Four of the city’s six basketball teams in the state’s largest classification have a new head coach. Three of the four played or coached for one of the Missoula teams in the past, while the fourth has his roots in Three Forks.
Here’s a look at the boys and girls teams from Hellgate, Sentinel and Big Sky.
Hellgate girls
Maddie Keast takes over the city’s most successful program in recent years. She replaces co-head coaches Rob and Brady Henthorn, who led the Knights to back-to-back state runner-up finishes, a third-place finish and a semifinal loss in the COVID-shortened tournament.
Keast got experience last year taking over a program with high expectations when she coached Loyola Sacred Heart, which made the state tournament three years in a row, shared the title once and placed third one time. She led the Breakers to the District 6B tournament title last season in her first year as a high school head coach.
“Everyone wants to win a state championship, and that’s a huge goal of ours,” she said of setting goals. “But I think just establishing a really cohesive group and establishing a sense of trust among the players and seeing everybody develop individually and translating that to wins and productive stats is important.
“The last couple years, they’ve been an absolute powerhouse and went undefeated until their state runs, which is impressive. I don’t know that’s going to be the same case this year. We’re going to probably experience more adversity and growing pains. But the reward at the end of that could be very fruitful and amazing as we get through those kinks.”
Before coaching Loyola last year, Keast spent the previous season as an assistant for longtime Sentinel coach Karen Deden. She won two state championships as a player under Deden in 2013 and 2014 at Sentinel.
Hellgate must replace seven seniors, including all-staters Bailee Sayler (Montana State Billings) and Keke Davis (Montana Western), second-team all-conference player Lauren Dick (Montana walk-on) and all-conference honorable mention Addy Heaphy. The Knights have back Alex Covill, a Washington State signee who was all-state and the Western AA defensive player of the year last season.
Keast expects junior Chloe Larsen to have a breakout year as a player and a leader. She’s looking for senior Maddy Petrino to take on a more substantial role. She also is looking forward to the defensive presence senior Sally Blakely will bring after missing the past two years due to health issues. The rest of the roster includes senior Faith Soden, juniors Carmen Anderson, Alix Mund, Lillie Lambert and Sophia Miller; sophomore Shannon Kane, and freshmen Gianna Passuccio and Elly Reed.
“With the shot clock being introduced this year, our style of play automatically is going to be faster. That’s the style I like to play,” Keast said. “Alex (Covill) at 6-foot-6 is mobile and capable of getting up and down the floor. I’m the type of coach if we can get easy buckets off steals, press and allowing aggressive defense to translate to easy offense, I like that style of play. It’s similar to what I played under Karen Deden.
“With that being said, also finding the right people in halfcourt sets capable of stepping up and scoring, whether that’s getting it inside to Alex, finding the open person outside on the three. More touches, ball movement and more likely everyone is open and our fluidity is there.”
Hellgate opens the season Friday at Billings West. Its first home game is Dec. 20 against Great Falls High.
Sentinel girls
Tyler Hobbs turned things around quite drastically in his lone season at Big Sky last year. He now takes over a program he’s familiar with and one that has more of a recent tradition of winning.
Hobbs led the Eagles to a 6-12 record, which was their best mark since 2016. It was an impressive showing given that they had won seven total games in the prior five seasons and were on their fourth coach in as many years.
“The goal is to be playing our best when our best is needed, and that’s the beginning of March,” Hobbs said. “The journey we’re on is to improve each day, get better, strengthen relationships and chemistry with one another and to enjoy the process.
“It’s hard in any sport to go undefeated. It’s to be expected to have some adversity. We can’t let a little bit of adversity or a tough loss or an injury or a sickness or anything like that you face during the season set us back for weeks. We’ve got to continue to progress on and move forward and get better.”
Hobbs replaced Sarah Pfeifer, who spent just one season coaching the Spartans after she took over for the longtime coach Deden. He previously had been an assistant for Deden and coached many of the Sentinel players he’ll get to work with now when they were on JV. He and Keast were on that same staff as varsity assistants.
The Spartans must replace second-team all-conference player Brooke Stayner, but they bring back six players who saw significant minutes last season. Highlighting that group are senior Olivia Huntsinger and junior Emily McElmurry, who were both all-conference honorable mention. Huntsinger has signed to play basketball at NCAA Division II Central Washington.
Sentinel also returns four other players who saw significant varsity minutes in seniors Lilly Allen, Kassidy Kirgan, Haley Wolsky and CC Size. Allen, Kirgan and Wolsky all played on the state runner-up soccer team. Kirgan has signed to play NCAA Division I soccer at Seattle University, while Allen has signed to play at Div. II Colorado Mesa. The rest of the roster includes junior Monroe Mastro and sophomore Kaitlyn Hammett
“I think we got a lot of really good athletes,” Hobbs said. “We’re not super tall, not a ton of length, but I think really good athletes that get up and down the floor and play a fast-paced style of basketball. I think it’s fun for the fans and the kids, keeps it exciting. We’ll take our lumps with it getting sloppy and unstructured, but I’m OK with that because they’ll get better and better working with each other as the season progresses.”
Sentinel opens the season Friday at Billings Skyview. Its first home game is Dec. 20 against Belgrade.
Big Sky girls
Travis Williams is the fifth coach in as many years for Big Sky, so building any sort of continuity has been difficult. He’s had success in his previous stops around the region and will look to bring that to the Eagles.
Williams came to Missoula after stops at Montana Western, Douglas (Wyoming) High School and most recently at Wenatchee (Washington) High School, where his teams went 87-58 overall and 64-32 in conference action while playing with a shot clock, which is new to Montana this season.
“I think you need to look at what your recent history has been and what your current roster makeup looks like and what your team’s aspirations are,” he said of setting goals. “A lot of what I’ve heard from casual conversations is they want to make the state tournament right now. That’s our main goal is playing well enough to make the state tournament, and once you get there, anything can happen.”
Williams is a Three Forks native who helped the Wolves win the 2001 State B championship and was named the State B tournament MVP. He later was an All-American at Carroll College, where he was teammates with Hellgate boys basketball head coach Jeff Hays.
The Eagles return all-state sophomore Kadynce Couture but must replace all-conference honorable mention Avari Batt. Williams has high expectations for freshman point guard Avery DeCoite. The rest of the roster includes seniors Maddie Jones and Dakota Belarde; juniors Audrey Hale, Avary Johnson and Delaney Laird; and sophomores Kyler Latrielle, Sadie McGuinn and Gianna Janacaro.
“I think our strength right now currently is our guards,” Williams said. “We’re pretty small. Our post players don’t have height, so we have to be a team that runs up and down the floor, pressures defensively and uses our strengths to our advantage. We’re not going to beat anybody with physical size, so we have to use our speed and quickness, get up and down the court, push the tempo and be in your face defensively.”
Big Sky opens the season Dec. 9 at Billings Senior. Its first home game is Dec. 20 against Great Falls CMR.
Big Sky boys
Zach Murphy had a front row seat to Big Sky’s turnaround the past two seasons as an assistant coach. He’s now promoted to the top chair on the bench and must replace a bevy of talented players while instilling his culture to keep the winning ways going.
Murphy replaces Ryan Hansen, who stepped down after leading the Eagles to a third-place finish at state last year, their best finish at state since 2007 and their first state trophy since 1997. It was their first trip to state since 2016. They also beat Hellgate for the first time since 2013.
“We want to play basketball the right way and be respected around the state and work hard in everything we do,” Murphy said of setting goals. “At the end of the game, we want to be in a spot to win the game, walk off the court and have others say that’s a hard team to play because they’re going to play hard.
“At the end of the year, if we look back, our goal is to win as many games as possible. I think we’re going to be identified as a program that plays hard and competes every game and competes hard in everything we do, earns respect and we should walk off the floor and feel good about the product we put out there.”
Murphy played for Sentinel when Craig Matosich was the coach and was an assistant there under former coach Jay Jagelski before he joined Big Sky. His father, Kelly Murphy, joined his staff this year as the JV coach after working under Sentinel head coach Jason Maki as recently as last year. He’s known Hellgate head coach Jeff Hays throughout his life going back to when he attended the Hays Hoop Camp as a kid.
The Eagles must replace seven seniors who graduated, including all-stater Caden Bateman (Montana) and Tre Reed (Rocky Mountain), a second-team all-conference player who was the Western AA defensive player of the year. Their only returner who played significant minutes last year is senior Josiah Cuaresma, who was an all-conference honorable mention.
Cuaresma is a projected starter along with seniors Tory Williams, Owen McGuinn and Aidan Beard, and sophomore Isaiah Reed. The rest of the roster includes seniors Lucas Thorne, Drew Paxton, Michael “Q” Hawk and McGil Sabado; juniors Colter Ramos and Michael Simonovich, and sophomore Carson Towe.
“Our roster might not be the biggest team in the world, like how Capital is built with towers,” Murphy said. “We’re not the tallest, but we’re pretty fast paced, can get up and down the floor, and defend hard. It’s an aggressive but fundamental style of basketball. Play good defense, limit fouls and get rebounds, put yourself in position to be competitive at the end of every game.”
Big Sky opens the season Dec. 9 at Billings Senior. Its first home game is Dec. 15 against Great Falls High.
Hellgate boys
Jeff Hays enters his 13th season as the Hellgate boys head coach. His team has missed the state tournament each of the past two years after qualifying in each of his first 10 seasons.
The Knights return all-state senior Connor Dick and fellow senior starter Asher Topp. Sophomore Easton Sant is back after playing starter minutes off the bench. They graduated six seniors, including all-conference honorable mention Dre Bowie and two current college football players in Ian Finch and Tommy Nilson
Hays expects Dick, Topp, Sant and senior Mario Rosemond to open the season as starters along with a combination of seniors Donovyn Headswift and Leo Filardi. Other players on the JV/varsity roster who could swing between the two levels are senior Cuinn Powers, juniors Calijah LaRance, Luke Hoppe, Liam Richardson and Timbur Nilson; sophomores Jacob Finch, Chance McNulty, Colter Russel and Rylan Davis; and freshmen Parker Link and Zane Gillhouse.
Hellgate opens the season Dec. 9 at Billings West. Its first home game is Dec. 17 against Belgrade.
Sentinel boys
Jason Maki begins his third season as the Sentinel boys head coach. He’s had two drastically different outcomes while leading his alma mater and experiencing massive roster turnover.
Maki led the Spartans to a third-place finish at state in his first year in 2020-21 with a team of college-bound basketball and football players. It was their first state trophy since a runner-up finish in 2008. Last season, they missed out on a state berth.
The Spartans must replace all-conference honorable mention Kaden Sheridan. They also graduated current college football players Drew Klumph, Joe Weida and Chase Williams; 6-foot-7 forward Peyton Stevens, and two other seniors in Clay Godwin and Colton Crass.
Maki projects seniors Brady Rupert and Trevor Rausch, and juniors Riley Allen, Holter Schweyen and Evan Richardson to start. The main players off the bench should be seniors Luke Allison and Patrick Sale, while other contributors could be seniors Eli Iverson and Randall Parker, and juniors Blake Taft and Danny Sirmon.
Sentinel opens the season Dec. 9 at Billings Skyview. Its first home game is Dec. 13 against Great Falls CMR.