Poplar Girls Return Starters, Shoot For Successful Year

The Poplar girls’ basketball team returns many key players from last season’s squad that came a game away from qualifying for the state tournament.

The returning varsity players for the Indians include Cammie Martell, Braelyn Nordwick, Mattie Falls Down Ayers, Sadee Archambeault, Toni Brown, Bailey Dupree, Kyra Stormy and Amelia Weeks.

Martell was an All-Conference selection and Falls Down Ayers was a second team pick last year.

Turnout for the program is 32 players. This is the second year that Frank “Bosh” Gourneau III is serving as the team’s head coach.

“There’s more familiarity,” Gourneau said of the relationship. “They won’t have to learn new things. There’s more consistency.”

He said a goal for the team is to get in the best shape possible.

“We will go game by game,” Gourneau said. “We will try to improve every game.”

He said the girls played between 24-28 games during the summer.

Gourneau hopes the girls can have another good run this post-season.

“The ball is always up in the air, get the season running” he said.

Poplar Girls’ Basketball Schedule

Dec. 6-7: Tip-off tournament in Great Falls Dec. 10: at Culbertson Dec. 13-14: Class B Tip-off (Lockwood) Dec. 20: at Harlem Jan. 3: Froid/Lake Jan. 11: Wolf Point Jan. 17: at Glasgow Jan. 18: at Fairview Jan. 25: Malta Jan. 28: Culbertson Jan. 30: at Froid/Lake Feb. 1: Harlem Feb. 7: Glasgow Feb. 8: Fairview Feb. 14: at Malta Feb. 15: at Wolf Point Feb. 19-22: District (Glasgow) Feb. 27-March 1: Girls Divisional (Malta) March 6-8: Boys Divisional (Cut Bank) March 13-15: State (Missoula)