Jefferson High Panther football closed out the season with a 61-14 win over Red Lodge Wednesday, October 18, in Red Lodge. The lopsided win demonstrated the power of this year’s Panther squad, even after multiple key players were sidelined by injury.
The Panthers had a very strong start to their season before the number of injuries piled up. Along the way, they faced and defeated three of the teams that have advanced to the playoffs – Florence, Shepherd and Manhattan – and lost by a single point to another playoff team, Big Timber.
The JHS boys ended their season with a 4-3 league record, 6-3 overall, after starting out 5-0. Whitehall won the district title with a 7-0 league, 9-0 overall re- cord, Manhattan took second (5-2, 6-2), Sweet Grass County third (5-2, 6-3), and Broadwater fourth (4-3, 4-4).
In this week’s first-round playoffs Shepherd (4-2, 4-4) is at White- hall (7-0, 9-0); Roundup (4-2, 4-4) will travel to Manhattan (5-2, 6-2);Sweet Grass County (5-2, 6-3) is hosted by Huntley Project (5-1, 6-2); and Broadwater (4-3, 4-4) crosses the state to Colstrip (5-1, 7-1). In other first round contests Cut Bank (3-3, 4-5) visits Lincoln County (5-0, 7-0); Fairfield (6-0, 8-0) hosts Florence; Bigfork (4-1, 6-1) competes in Shelby (5-1, 5-3); and Malta (4-2, 6-2) faces Missoula Loyola in Mis- soula (5-1, 6-3).
In regular season stats, the Panthers averaged 27.4 points a game on offense and 10.9 points on defense. Lincoln County was the top in points per game on offense with 45.6, and Fairfield gave up the fewest points per game with a 4.0 average.
