Nelson steps down at Great Falls Central

Nelson steps down as Central football coach

Great Falls Central head football coach Mike Nelson has chosen to step down from that position, according to a statement released by the school’s AD, Jamie Stevens.

The statement read: “Coach Nelson is still going to be a part of the Mustangs’ coaching staff, but he would like more flexibility to travel to watch his son, Reid, play for Montana Tech.”

Nelson, who was 32-22 in six years at Central and 165-44 between Central and Highwood, was selected to coach at the Bob Cleaverly Eight-Man All-Star Game this spring. The Mustangs were 6-3 last season, falling in their first round playoff game at Victor Oct. 30.

Stevens says the school has started the search for Nelson’s replacement.

Americans edge Wild

It’s now 23 straight games without a loss in regulation for the Great Falls Americans.

Jeff Heimel’s club earned a 2-1 decision over the visiting Gillette Wild on Friday night at the Great Falls IcePlex, where Tegan Harrington and Ricards Bernhards provided the scoring.

The Americans are 26-3-2-3 on the season. Great Falls goalie Nick Nast faced only 12 shots in the game, stopping 11 of them. Brendan Jester, Kody Thomas, Tanner Congdon and Payton McSharry all tallied an assist. Great Falls had 34 shots on net.

The Americans and Wild take the ice against each other again Saturday night at the IcePlex, to begin at 7:30.

S. Oregon football coach Howard dies

ASHLAND, Ore. – Craig Howard, who led the Southern Oregon football team to the NAIA national championship in 2014, died Thursday night at his home, the school announced. He was 64.

Howard was 50-23 in six seasons with the Raiders. In his second season, he led the Raiders to the 2012 Frontier Conference title and their first NAIA postseason appearance in 10 years. In 2013 he led Southern Oregon to a second straight appearance in the national championship game.

Howard was a 1974 graduate of Linfield College. He started his collegiate coaching career as a defensive coordinator at Oregon Tech and Portland State. He got his first head job in 1991 at Oregon Tech, where he went 8-13 in two seasons. He went 76-23 as a head high school coach in Florida from 2003 to 2010. At Nease (Fla.) High, where he mentored future Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow, he went to three championship games and won the 2005 state title.

He is survived his wife, Valerie; his daughters Amy and Emily; his sons Bo, Jordan and Ryan; and his grandchildren.

Lady Griz to honor Selvig

Robin Selvig won a lot of basketball games as head coach of the Montana Lady Griz.

Eight-hundred sixty-five, to be exact.

Fans of the Montana women’s basketball team hope Selvig can bring them one more on Saturday.

On Saturday afternoon at 2 at Dahlberg Arena, the Lady Griz will celebrate Selvig when the Lady Griz welcome Sacramento State (6-11 overall, 2-4 in conference) to Missoula for a Big Sky Conference matchup. Selvig, who announced his retirement last July, coached 38 seasons at Montana and enjoyed remarkable success.

UM (3-15, 0-7) has dropped its last nine games. In Thursday’s 64-44 loss to Portland State, Hamilton product Taylor Goligoski and former Malta star Hailey Nicholson each scored eight points.

The Montana men’s basketball is in Sacramento, Calif., for a contest against Sacramento State (5-12, 2-4) at 8 p.m. Travis DeCuire’s group is now 10-10 overall and 5-2 in conference after a setback on Thursday to Portland State, just the third loss against the Vikings in the last 16 tries.

Oregon transfer Ahmaad Rorie and Fabijan Krslovic both tallied career-highs in scoring, netting 29 and 24 markers, respectively.

MSU men seek 3rd straight win

The Montana State men’s basketball has won two straight conference games, and freshman guard Harald Frey is a big reason why the Bobcats have escaped from the bottom of the Big Sky Conference standings.

Fray has scored 41 combined points in victories over Northern Colorado and Sacramento State, hitting on 8-for-14 3-pointers as Brian Fish’s squad enters Saturday’s 8 p.m. road game against Portland State (11-6 overall, 4-2 in conference) with an 8-12 overall record and 3-4 in conference.

The 6-foot-1 rookie from Norway has drained 23 of his 39 attempts (58.9 percent) from behind the arc during conference play and hasn’t turned the ball over once while playing 66 minutes in the last two games. Throw in Tyler Hall, the country’s fifth-best scorer at 23.2 points per game, and the Bobcats have been playing better basketball of late.

The MSU women (12-5, 5-2) face Portland State (10-8, 4-2) on Saturday afternoon at 2. The game is at Worthington Arena in Bozeman. Riley Noordgard notched a double-double (26 points, 10 boards) in an 84-80 victory against Sacramento State on Thursday night.

Central plays host to dual tourney

Class B-C wrestling action comes to the Electric City Saturday as Great Falls Central welcomes in seven teams for the Great Falls Central Duals at 10 a.m.

The bracket-style dual tournament will feature the host Mustangs, Whitehall, Columbus-Absarokee, Anaconda, Cascade, Townsend, Deer Lodge and Belt.

Central head coach Eric Hinebauch, who took over the brand new program a season ago, said he hopes this year’s tourney will serve as a stepping stone to getting more teams from around the B-C to attend in future seasons.

“I think that it would be good for the B-C to follow suit with Class AA and Class A and crown the best dual team (in the classification),” Hinebauch said. “Obviously this year we were unable to get the full range of B-C teams to come but I pitched it at our divisional meeting and I got a lot of support from the Southern B-C so we’ll start from there and hopefully build.”

Hinebauch said Great Falls serves as a great location for the duals as it is centrally located in the state and is a very positive thing for the program moving forward.

“Great Falls Central is in a great location for a lot of teams to come to,” Hinebauch said. “We don’t exactly have the greatest dual team right now because of our numbers at the moment but I think it’s an important thing for the B-C and I’m happy to use my location and be able to showcase Central.”

Hinebauch said the Mustangs have come along nicely in their second season and that have been competing this season, four of which started last year.

“It’s been a good year,” he said. “Obviously last year was just about getting kids introduced to the sport and going over the basics but we have more of a foundation this year and we’ve been able to step up a notch. We have some kids back this year that have been making strides. It’s a process but it’s been coming along pretty nice.”

Juniors Trevor Yuhas, Tyler Stevens and Noah Newman have returned to the mat this season as well as sophomore Alex Tooley. Hinebauch said he feels Central qualified five grapplers for the state meet last year and he hopes to be in the same range again this year.

There’s more mat action going on in the area this weekend as well with the Conrad Mixer finishing up on Saturday at 10 a.m. while the Class A Duals begin the second and final day at 9 a.m.

All 20 Class A schools will be competing in Lewistown while host Conrad, Choteau, JV units from C.M. Russell High and Great Falls High, Valier, Jefferson and Shelby are competing at the Conrad Mixer.