The Daily Inter Lake won 11 awards at the 2017 Better Newspaper Contest banquet, which was held in Lewistown on Saturday night.

The Inter Lake’s popular annual guidebook “101 Things to Do in the Flathead,” which is overseen by Features Editor Lynnette Hintze, was first-place winner in the special section category.

The Inter Lake was also honored with a second-place award for Best Overall Website (www.dailyinterlake.com) among all the state’s newspapers.

Brenda Ritter, a longtime ad designer at the Inter Lake, won three awards, including first place for Best Image Building Ad, third place for Best Ad to Sell or Promote Services and third place for Best Sponsor Page.

Joe Terry and Andy Viano shared a second place for Best Page Design and a third place for Best Sports Page Design for their creative work in promoting the local Athlete of the Year feature.

Inter Lake Regional Editor Matt Baldwin won a third-place award for Best Page Design for a Montana Life page about “Cave Camp.” Baldwin also won six awards for his work at the Whitefish Pilot, where he was editor until September 2016.

The Inter Lake’s photographers both won one award each. Brenda Ahearn took third place in Best News Photo for a courtroom photo accompanying a story entitled “Child killer changes plea.” Aaric Bryan won third place in Best Lifestyles Photo for a shot from Cabin Fever Days.

Ad designer Shawn Withrow won a second place for Best Newspaper Promotional Ad for his ad touting the Inter Lake’s role in helping readers “Stay Informed in the Community.”

The Inter Lake’s new business reporter, Mackenzie Reiss, who starts here next month, won 21 awards in the competition and helped her paper, the Big Timber Pioneer, win the Thomas Dimsdale Award for Best Weekly Newspaper in Montana.

The annual competition is sponsored by the Montana Newspaper Association. Unless otherwise specified, the Inter Lake competed against the state’s largest dailies in all categories. Among the weekly papers affiliated with the Inter Lake, the Whitefish Pilot won 22 awards, the Hungry Horse News won 13, The Western News won six and the Mineral Independent won two.