BILLINGS — Nate Hammond’s philosophy, and thus the ethos of the Malta M-ettes’ basketball program, is that the big goals can wait.
While other teams might focus on the big picture on the first day of practice, writing things like “go to state” or “play Saturday night” on their whiteboards, Hammond saves slogans like that for later in the year.
At season’s start — and this is Hammond’s 12th as the girls basketball coach at Malta — he likes to keep things simpler.
“We try to keep it more week to week, you know, hey, we just beat a good team, or we just lost to a really good team, but we're going to have to improve in this area, in this area, in this area,” Hammond told MTN Sports. “We’ll talk about those big goals a little bit as we go, but we don’t need to talk about them right now.”
Just two games into the 2024-25 season, the M-ettes have had a lot of things to talk about. A state semifinalist last season, they opened their new season against last year’s third-place winner and last year’s state championship squad.
Last Friday, at a tournament in Lewiston, Malta suffered a 66-41 loss to Huntley Project, last season’s consolation champion and a team that figures to be a championship contender again with high-scoring Gonzaga-bound senior Paige Lofing.
Malta turnovers and a strong start by Project saw the Red Devils gain a 24-10 lead. Malta never recovered as Lofing finished with a game-high 28 points.
“I felt like we scratched and clawed, and I know I looked up (at the scoreboard) once in the second half, and we're within nine,” Hammond said. “We just needed to catch a break. Huntley is just real good, they're very experienced, and they shoot the ball so well, and they just wouldn't give us one.”
There wasn’t much time to lick any wounds. The next day loomed Baker, the defending state champion, and Saturday didn’t start any better for the M-ettes.
Baker raced out to a 16-6 first-quarter lead, and still led by eight going into the fourth quarter. But Montana State commit Madison O’Connor fouled out with about three minutes remaining after scoring 25 points, and the M-ettes managed to take a couple late leads.
Avery O’Connor’s 3-pointer with about 10 seconds to go gave Baker a 46-45 lead. Malta got the ball up court and Hammond called timeout to set up a final play.
It didn’t exactly work out as planned, but Malta’s Kendall Clausen took advantage of a Baker defensive breakdown for the go-ahead layup and a 47-46 lead before Baker was able to get a long 3-point shot off at the buzzer that was unsuccessful.
A nice win, to be sure, against another title hopeful. True to form, though, the lesson Hammond received had nothing to do with his own team, which features two returning all-state players in juniors Denvyr Tuss and Neva Jacobson, being in the championship picture after the weekend split with two of Class B’s best.
Instead, Hammond was fretting about all the turnovers his team committed, and how the M-ettes will need to cut those down this Friday. That’s when Malta plays Florence, a team the M-ettes defeated in the first round of last year’s state tournament.
Three games to start the 2024-25 campaign, all against state-tournament teams from a year ago. Also ahead before the Christmas break is a matchup with perennial Class A contender Havre.
“I don't think it's necessarily good to 0 and 5, I think that could be tough,” Hammond said about his team’s early schedule. “But if you can win a few games and play pretty well, then as a coach, you can keep them going and keep building on stuff.
“So you like to win the games, but you don't want it to be too easy, either, because you want to keep those kids understanding that they've got a long way to go still.”
There is plenty of time for the M-ettes to think about the state tournament. Right now, though, they’re focused on using this difficult schedule to make them better, week to week.
