Lady Mavs make impression

The Lady Mavericks found themselves in the consolation finals in the Eastern C Divisional last February, but fell to Froid-Lake, missing out on state this year.

The team proved to be a force in the 3C District, and that was evidenced in the 3C All-Conference list, as the team took three of the twelve spots. Scobey was the only team that listed more players with four Lady Spartans named.

Named in order of votes received, Lady Maverick junior Kaitlyn McColly was number two on the list. Fellow junior Kia Wasson was selected fourth and sophomore Jaycee Erickson was selected fifth.

All three athletes were also named to the All-State team, and McColly and Erickson were named to the Defensive team.

The following are notes about each athlete named to the list from Lady Mavericks Head Coach Amber Erickson:

-- Kailtyn McColly-averaged 15 pts. a game, 6.8 rebounds. Kaitlyn was very consistent this year in terms of scoring and defense. She is a strong player who is tough to stop inside and has a beautiful pull-up jump shot. Her work ethic both in practice and games makes a lot of great things happen on our team.

-Kia Wasson-averaged 12.3 pts a game, 5 rebounds. Kia has established herself as a great outside shooter. She did a great job attacking the boards this season and is really starting to become more of an all-around scorer looking to shoot off the dribble and coming off screens. She does a great job running the floor hard on both ends.

-Jaycee Erickson-averaged 8.3 pts a game, 3.6 assists. Jaycee did a great job this year of handling a majority of the full-court pressure being our point guard and primary ball-handler. She always has her head up in transition and gets us into our sets and offenses. She shot the ball with more confidence and continues to fine-tune her offensive moves and basketball IQ.

-Kaitlyn and Jaycee also both made the All-Defensive team. There are only five players in the conference that are selected for this award. Kaitlyn oftentimes draws the best post or guard depending on the guard's size. Jaycee is a very strong 1 on 1 defender that will most nights guard the other teams point guard or leading guard if they have an inside out game. We take a lot of pride in our man to man defense and overall this is an area we are continuing to improve on as a team.

-Kaitlyn, Kia, and Jaycee also were named to the Class C All-State list. These three are very deserving of this honor, they contribute to our team in many different ways, they put in a lot of time in the offseason and show up to practice every day ready to work and bring the intensity we need to improve. --

The team had one lone senior last season, Elise Strommen, who had been on the team since her eighth-grade year.

"She overcame a lot of adversity throughout her 5 years in our program," Coach Erickson said. "She is an awesome person and teammate. Elise improved greatly and I believe she gave us everything she could on the floor. We will miss her positive team-first attitude and smiling face next year."

Though the stats were not available to the PCN, Coach Erickson was proud of how her team performed in 2019-20. Coach Erickson said there weren't any surprises, but she was proud of how the team was able to play an uptempo game while cutting down on turnovers this year.

"We rebounded better overall as a team and became more consistent both from the free-throw line and in our half-court offenses," Coach Erickson said.

When asked about her favorite memories of the 2019-20 season, Coach Erickson said that she had a couple, the first of which was during senior night in Hinsdale as the team defeated Lustre 76-13 in February.

"The girls all played great but what stands out to me was the game our only senior on the team had that night," Coach Erickson said. "Elise had the best overall game in her High School career scoring 11 pts, pulling down 4 rebounds and picking up 4 steals. It was awesome to see her teammates feed her the ball and execute set plays to give her chances to continue to score."

The second favorite memory involved Froid-Lake, the team that defeated the Lady Mavs in the consolation finals of the Eastern C Divisional Tournament. But the teams had clashed earlier in the tournament, and the Mavericks won the opening game 61-60 sending North Country to the semifinals.

"It was a back and forth game the whole time, we were able to pull ahead in the third quarter by about 6-8 points only for them to go on a run and find ourselves down eight with less than four minutes to go," Coach Erickson said. "The girls just kept fighting, making all the hustle plays, we were able to set up some set plays and get Kia going from the perimeter and continue to find Kaitlyn down low. Kelsee hit two HUGE free throws to put us up by one. We made an excellent defensive stop that ended with a steal in the hands of none other than our only senior!"

The State C Basketball Tournament came to an abrupt end on the night of Friday, March 13, as the MHSA chose to end the tournament after the semi-final round that night. Though the team did not qualify for state, a few Lady Mavericks attended the event, including Coach Erickson.

"It was a really weird situation to just finish up watching the two Class C girls teams fight their way into the State Championship game only to find out they would be denied the opportunity to play that game," Coach Erickson said. "I can't imagine what the teams, coaches and seniors who were still left vying for a chance at a coveted state trophy felt to just be told it was done!"

Coach Erickson also said that she understands the severity of the situation and said that the virus is very serious and that it is important to stay safe and healthy. Still, Coach Erickson knows that the cancellation of basketball and the possibility of missing spring sports and activities will be a struggle.

"It's hard to think about all the spring activities, sports, tournaments, Prom, senior trips, graduations, music festivals, etc. that have been canceled and that the kids are missing out on, but we are all in this together and in the end, we will look back and realize how little significance these events truly have compared to our overall picture of life."