BOISE, Idaho — For yet another year, the Big Sky Conference women’s basketball tournament will have a new champion.
Since the league moved its postseason to a neutral site, the league has seen seven different champions and one championship game called off. Every champion has been a different one from the year before, and that will again be the case this year.
Although repeating has proved impossible for almost a decade in Big Sky in women’s hoops, the fact did nothing to heal the shattered hearts of Montana State’s unforgettable team Sunday after a 77-65 loss to Portland State knocked the Bobcats out in the quarterfinals.
From the moment she opened eyes and turned heads with her transcendent freshman debut until she finished her career as the second-leading scorer in MSU women’s hoops history (despite hardly being categorized as a scorer), Darian White has carved out a reputation as one of the most versatile players in the history of the league.
After bouncing back from a horrible knee injury her senior year at Billings Senior High to become a multiple-time All-Big Sky power forward who also served as an advocate and ambassador for Native American women everywhere, Kola Bad Bear will be remembered as a Montana Indian legend.
From serving as a high energy sparkplug as a freshman on a Big Sky championship team to enduring battles with injury and illness to reemerging as a pivotal defensive stalwart in MSU’s deep rotation, Madison Jackson joined her other two four-year seniors to help Montana State to 84 victories, the most in MSU women’s hoops history by one class.
“It’s heartbreaking knowing that we are finishing off like this because I know we have so much more talent than we showed,” White said after finishing with 14 points and seven rebounds. “We have so much more to prove and it sucks because there’s nothing we can do about it now. Our season is over. But I’m really proud of the season we’ve had and I think this season was overall a really good experience, and I’m looking forward to seeing what the girls do next year.”
Montana State had huge moments throughout the season, including another sweep of rival Montana and a come-from-behind win over Big Sky co-champion Sacramento State. But MSU stumbled down the stretch, losing at Sac State and to EWU at home to miss out on sealing an outright Big Sky banner.
“We were used to trying to repeat as champions from the get go, we’ve always kind of had a target on our backs,” Bad Bear said. “Coming into this year, nothing was good enough. We were used to having a winning culture and a winning team. It wasn’t too much pressure. It was the battle in our heads. Outright, we have a really talented team every year and we have something more to prove.”
When the trio of MSU seniors were freshmen, they were the only three underclassmen in a rotation that included six seniors. That squad rolled to a league-record 19 conference victories and seemed a sure bet to advance to the NCAA Tournament for the second time in three seasons.
Instead, the global pandemic cost them a trip to the Big Dance, giving White, Bad Bear and Jackson new motivation as they grew older.
Last season, White played her best basketball in her hometown of Boise, leading MSU to the BSC tournament title and earning MVP honors along the way.
MSU returned pretty much everyone in its rotation coming into this season. The Bobcats were the preseason league favorites and White was the preseason choice for league MVP.
And even when MSU dropped its final home game last week to upstart Eastern Washington, many around the Big Sky wondered if that loss, combined with White’s MVP snub for the fourth year in a row, might be the motivation the Bobcats needed.
Instead, Montana State missed 16 of its first 18 field goal attempts while Portland State hit nine first-half 3-pointers and 15 triples overall on the way to a double-digit victory.
“I love these kids and I’m heartbroken for them,” MSU 18th-year head coach Tricia Binford said. “The last couple of games were tough from the mental aspect. Senior year, you get to that point, you want things to go a certain way and we couldn’t find it between the ears the last couple of games.”
With her 14 points, White moved into second place in Montana State history with 1,716 points. She passed Katie Bussey, currently an MSU assistant coach, for the honor.
“Endings are hard, but journeys are amazing and our journey together has been amazing,” Binford said.
White played and started 120 games in her incomparable career. She finishes as the only player in Big Sky Conference history with more than 1,700 points, 600 rebounds, 400 assists and 200 steals. She is a four-time All-Big Sky selection who also earned league Defensive Player of the Year honors twice.
“I hope we are remembered for doing anything it takes to win,” White said. “Coach Bin and the other coaches, they recruit amazing girls with great character. They have an expectation and a standard for every player who is on the team. And they taught us that from the beginning, especially with other players they had on the team. We were able to continue that and fulfill our expectations with the way we wanted to play.
“Unfortunately, it ended not how we wanted it to, but they are going to keep doing great things.”
Bad Bear spearheaded the “No More Stolen Sisters” initiative to bring awareness to the dire issue of human trafficking of indigenous women from Montana’s seven Indian reservations. She hosted multiple games to spread the word and even helped the initiative take on a new representative in MSU men’s star RaeQuan Battle, a member of the Tulalip tribe who also has relatives who are Crow, like Bad Bear.
“Everyone knows about No More Stolen Sisters,” Binford said. “She is an ambassador. And we are going to continue taking that torch that Kola started on campus. These are special young women.”
Bad Bear finished with 11 points and six rebounds to cap a senior season in which she earned second-team All-Big Sky honors.
“I hope we showed what a winning culture looks like and what a family looks like on and off the court,” Bad Bear said. “I hope they can continue to exemptlify that. I think that’s one thing that has always set our team apart, is our connection off the court and how much we truly love each other. I hope that continues to happen and I know it will with this group of girls and the team coming back next year.”
Although their Big Sky Tournament championship hopes are over, much of the future still remains uncertain. The door is not completely shut on all three four-year seniors using an extra season of eligibility.
More important, for the immediate future, is that MSU has 20 wins and will receive consideration for a postseason bid outside the NCAA Tournament.
“Unless you are winning the national championship, everyone is ending on a loss, and you want to honor your seniors the best you can,” Binford said. “I think this senior class knows they are appreciated.
“They are the winningest class in Bobcat history and that speaks for itself. I’m extremely proud of them.”
