BUTTE — At the end of the day, Butte High's MacKenzie Tutty was just glad that she and her team got to play a game.
"It was such a relief," Tutty said shortly after she and the Bulldogs' girls basketball team opened their season with a 70-36 rout of Missoula Big Sky at the Butte Civic Center on Saturday. "After seeing that the boys game got delayed because of a COVID case we were kind of nervous."
The Butte High and Big Sky boys were also supposed to play on Saturday but that game was postponed due to coronavirus concerns.
Butte's win over the Eagles was the first high school basketball game at the Civic Center since the semifinal round of the State B tournament on March 13. The championships were canceled shortly after those games.
Tutty, one of Butte's four seniors, led the way with 21 points as the Bulldogs quickly overwhelmed Big Sky, which is still searching for its first win since December 2018. Butte built a 39-9 halftime lead in which the Bulldogs limited the Eagles to a single point in the second quarter.
Tutty poured in 13 of her points in the second quarter. Ashley Olsen, a 6-foot-3 junior post, added 13 points for the Bulldogs and Emmarie Richards and McCaul McCarthy each had 8.
Corbyn Sandau led Big Sky with 13 points and Audrey Hale had 8.
"We were really excited just to get out here and show what we've been working at for the past month," Tutty said.
