Mavericks' inaugural season ends in Malta

The season came to an end for the North Country Mavericks, who lost out in the consolation final of the 2016 3C District Tournament in Malta. The score of their final game was 57-44.

Before their final loss, North Country made some noise in the Malta Gymnasium taking out Nashua in the first round of the tourney. The score was 67-59. They then lost to Scobey in the semi-final round. The score of that game was 50-31. Their last win would come against Dodson by a 69-34 victory.

In their opening win against Nashua, Sophomore Trace Simonson led the team with 27 points and six rebounds.

“We played pretty good together,” Trace Simonson said. “We played some good defense on them and even though Cache had to leave a little early due to a knee injury, we kind of grouped together and started pounding it down their throats.”

Simonson’s performance was as dominant as any performance seen in Phillips County, class B or C.

“I was just doing what I had to do for us to win,” Simonson said.

Senior Layne Engel scored 11 points. Cache Younkin scored nine points but had to leave early due to a knee injury he had before halftime.

Chris DePuydt had seven points. John McColly had six points.

Mavencamp, who scored four points and had six rebounds, looked quite confident under the net.

“I’ve been a post pretty much my whole high school career,” Mavencamp said. “So it’s natural now, I guess.”

Logan McColly had two points and Wrangler Jones had one.

Being one of the team’s senior starters, Mavencamp applauded the team’s effort, though he admitted there was room for improvement.

“I’d probably give us a seven,” he said. “We worked pretty well, but we weren’t as fluent or as we should’ve been.”

The game was a pretty physical game that forced the team to keep pace with a pretty up-tempo team in an act where speed and physicality was seen.

“Physicality really doesn’t bother us anymore,” Mavencamp said. “We’ve faced it all season so we just roll with it.”