Athlete of the Week

KSEN/K96—Bozeman Trophy Athletes of the Week receive high praise from their coaches for attitude and ability.

Our female Athlete of the Week has been contributing to the Cut Bank Lady Wolves since she was a freshman and now as a Sr. Cut Bank Head Coach Brandon Kavanagh says she is “one of the toughest players in the 1B.  Point guard Aliyah Cruz had 3 big games in the past week with 47 points, 13 rebounds and 10 steals against Choteau, Browning and Shelby.

Coach Kavanagh says has really played well heading into the Tournaments and can be a dangerous player once she gets going.   Beyond the points, rebounds and steals, Cruz runs the offensive show and Kavanagh notes that even against Browning when you get all kinds of pressure and a bunch of long, athletic bodies, she "never got rattled."   In the Shelby game she once again handled the full court pressure and found a great balance between attacking herself and facilitating the offense.

Cruz finds a way to get all those rebounds at just 5’5”and according to the Coach has one “of the prettiest pull-up jumpers I’ve ever seen.”

Our Male Athlete of the Week just accomplished something that not many High School Players here achieve.  Heart Butte’s Thomas Young Running Crane, a starter on Heart Butte’s undefeated team reached a Thousand points scoring and He’s just a Jr. which means a whole year to add to it.

Heart Butte Head Coach Kellen Hall was thrilled to have Young Running Crane nominated and what he told us was most impressive is that the player that they call “Bear Cub,” reached that goal “Very unselfishly, never made it an issue and never brought it up once even though he knew he was close."  Hall says not saying anything at all but just doing his job “truly impressed me.”  Coach Hall says, "The Warriors always say, 'When one does good, we all do good.' and 'Bear Cub' has done a lot of good, putting in a lot of unseen work to reach that landmark."  He said, "It was something the entire Heart Butte Community got behind and celebrated."

In games last week, Young Running Crane had 22 points against Browning JV, the game where he reached a 1,000 and he added 8 rebounds and 8 steals.  Against Simms, 18 points, 5 rebounds and 4 steals.

Congratulations to our KSEN/K96—Bozeman Trophy Athletes of the Week, Sr. Aliyah Cruz of Cut Bank and Jr. Thomas Young Running Crane of Heart Butte.  The Athlete of the week is sponsored locally by McDonald’s in Cut Bank. McDonald’s honors our Athlete’s with two free value meals each.

KSEN encourages all fans, parents and coaches to nominate an Athlete of the Week when you feel like they’ve had an above average performance.

Email: markdaniels@townsquaremedia.com.