2016 M-ette track team honored

The Malta M-ettes have had a great year winning both the 2016 State B Basketball Title and most recently the 2016 State B Track and Field title in May.

In case you missed it, the school honored the M-ettes a few days after their impressive season ended with a trophy presentation and recap of the track year for the thirteen that performed at the state meet and the coaches that helped push them to make history.

The event was kicked off by the handing of the State Title Trophy from senior Kaitlyn Smith, who won the Shot Put Event, to Malta Schools Superintendent Kris Kuehn. The handing of the trophy was followed by a few words of the event's emcee Malta High School Principal Scott King.

"On behalf of Malta Public Schools and our community, congratulations to the M-ettes on your state championship," King said. "Like we've come to expect from our M-ette athletic teams, not only did you compete on Fridays and Saturdays but you did it in a very gracious manner. You handled yourselves with great composure and most of all you do it in a manner that you represent our community with all that is good about being a student athlete."

King noted that the team had competitors in fourteen of the seventeen events, and in those events Malta placed in eight different events.

King, who watched the events from a high vantage point, noticed just how close the M-ettes were en lieu of the fact that track is known as an individual sport.

"The M-ettes throughout the whole course of this season have really gone about their business in a team-like manner," he said. "The one thing that I always see is one or two or three or four M-ettes always traveling together. Even if they are going to other events, you don't see a kid just going by themselves. They are always with teammates and that's what teammates do in an individual sport but while you're stressing being a team. And you certainly are a team."

He thanked them for being a great example to all that were watching them not only at the state meet, but throughout the season.

Coach Schye went on to call out each member and honor them in front of the crowd of a hundred people that watched the ceremony that wasn't projected to happen.

"I've had a chance to reflect on what went on this past weekend because really, when we went to the state track meet we were going there to win a trophy," Coach Schye said.

At the time Coach Schye was talking about competing for any trophy with Bigfork being projected to win the title. Schye was asked by assistant coach Travis Somerfeld, which trophy were they aiming for.

"All of a sudden we realized that if everything on paper holds true Bigfork was going to beat us by six and in the best case scenario five," Coach Schye said. "Well let's just say Bigfork was negative 21 and the Malta M-ettes scored 71."

After day one it seemed to the outside eye, Malta would fall behind Shelby, who had 31 points to Malta's 13.

"Your belief in yourself has to be unwavering," Coach Schye said. "Somebody asked me were you concerned?"

Schye was not concerned. The next day Malta scored 58 points, more than the total they were projected.

Schye went back to what he promised at the athletic awards banquet only a few weeks ago.

"This is our 2016 Malta Track and Field team," Schye said. "They will be going to the district meet; they will represent the community of Malta, Malta High School and their parents very well. I'll tell you what, These M-ettes not only on the track and on the field butt as representatives around the community of Bozeman, they represented you very well and I am proud of them."