Sweet vindication: ‘Juggernaut’ Dragons finish championship season with more domination

NAMPA — While addressing the Ford Idaho Center crowd following the 3A girls’ basketball state championship game Saturday, Ambrose head coach Kirk Crager referred to the Malad Dragons as a “juggernaut.”

Malad played like a juggernaut all season before stepping their play up to another level at the state tournament. The Dragons won their three tourney games by a combined 79 points — winning by an average of 26.3 points per game — including a 68-43 victory in Saturday’s championship game.

Head coach Trevor Jones spoke about his team and how he has been able to, at times this season, sit back and just enjoy the juggernaut.

“Being able to win by 20-plus, that’s a statement,” Jones said. “When they play, you just sit back and enjoy the show, as the coach … you let the reigns go and let them do what they do.”

Malad entered the 2025-26 season coming off the sourest possible end to the year, losing the state championship game by three points last year. Jones and his team has focused all year on putting out maximum effort on every single possession, on both ends of the court, to create separation and prevent the slow start that doomed them in the 2025 title game.

When asked if their plus-79 performance over the weekend proved they did precisely that, senior point guard Mikeel Keetch answered with a resound, “Yeah, it does.”

“A lot of it was our defense,” she said. “Last year, our defense struggled, and that’s how we lost the game — because we allowed too many points. This year, we locked in — everyone played good defense, we talked.”

Malad leaned on its offense in the first quarter, scoring 24 points to grab a nine-point advantage after eight minutes. From there, it was the Dragon defense that led the way, holding the Archers to 26.5% shooting from the field for the game, while forcing nine turnovers.

Ambrose’s best answer for the Malad defense was guard Annelise Curran, whose five made 3-pointers led to a game-high 21 points.

Offensively, the Dragons answered with 14 points from Keetch, 13 from Paityn Ward, 10 apiece from Brynnlee Jones and Izzy Haycock, and an 11-point, 12-rebound game from senior center Olivia Nelson.

After the game, Jones spoke about the balanced attack that made Malad special all season, saying that any of their top seven players are capable of starring.

“But you shine so much brighter as a team,” the coach said. “To be able to step into roles and be team players, great teammates, that’s the definition of these kids.”

Nelson personified that team-first mentality, saying after the game that she has worked hard every day to improve as a paint scorer, post defender, and rebounder, despite playing on a team dominated by wing play. finishing with a double-double and two blocks in a state championship game made all that work and every second spent in the gym worth it.

Keetch took a moment to speak about the way Nelson has committed to improving, regardless of whether the results ended up on a statsheet.

“She is so good,” Keetch said of Nelson. “She does all the little things — she works hard and doesn’t get a lot of credit, but she does the things that help our team. We’re so grateful for her.”

With the win, Jones, Keetch and Nelson all agreed, Malad can put the loss in last year’s championship game behind them.

“It feels so good,” Keetch said. “Ever since we lost last year, we’ve wanted it so bad. Coming back and being tough this year — we felt the pain, now feeling the victory is so great.”

Nelson talked about the championship moment being a goal for Malad’s five seniors — Nelson, Keetch, Haycock, Brynnlee and Kiley Miller — since they started playing together, which, according to Keetch has been as long as she can remember.

“We’ve wanted this — the five starters — since we were in, like, fourth grade. Finally getting it in our senior year feels great,” Nelson said.

Jones recalled coaching this group of seniors when they played Junior Jazz.

“We saw something in them early,” he said. “We started in elementary, and we just knew there was something special about them. The way they work, the way they play, they were dedicated. When a group of people come together and set big goals, it’s amazing what they’ll do to accomplish those.”

Battling back tears, the coach spoke about the legacy this group of seniors will leave on the school, Malad City and Oneida County.

“The legacy they brought to Malad … for four years, they showed all of Idaho what Malad basketball is all about,” he said. “Taking a banner back that’s going to hang up there forever, that does mean something. That’s pretty special.”

With all the work now behind them, the only thing left for the Dragons is celebrating. Jones said that the Malad community has been incredibly supportive os his team and will, no doubt, honor the squad.

Before that, there is a three-hour bus ride back home.

Nelson said she expects the long ride to be “crazy.”

“Izzy’s going to have her speaker out, and we’re going to be jamming out,” Keetch added, saying she expects the trophy will spend the ride being passed around.

Jones is not so sure about that.

“I’m sure, once we get out of Boise, the exhaustion of what they’ve done, what they’ve accomplished, will set in,” he said. “It’s going to be a rollercoaster of emotion.”