There’s no going back now in high school sports.

Win and go on or lose and fall back to the reality of future life without sports. No more practices, no more planning ahead for the next game or looking back on the last ones. No more game days, it’s really over.

Quite suddenly and quite soon it will all be water under the bridge, this latest season of fall sports, another journey of smaller journeys rolled into one now completed and to be filed in 2025, under the seasons of our lives.

Noxon football coach Lucas MacArthur got me thinking about it last week when he talked about going back, if you could, and changing some things you did in a game that you would do differently given time to think about it.

But, really, can you ever go back, once you go ahead and do what you have decided to do? And is questioning that the important thing anyway?

When you were right there in the moment you were learning, that’s the important thing. Now you know better than you did before, but you had to go through what you just went through to fully understand that. Didn’t you?

Second guessing is such useless speculation.

Better luck next time holds true until alas, you run out of next times like almost all teams always eventually do. Especially at this late date in the fall sports seasons.

Those teams that seemed so young and inexperienced only a few short weeks ago have evolved into battle-tested veteran squads, but the testing now ends with semifinal and championship games in football, and with the Montana All-Class volleyball tournament in Bozeman this week.

With or without you, the playoffs always march on.

In the football playoffs, a few western Montana teams remain alive.

Of local interest, in the 6-Man playoffs, Lincoln defeated Richey-Lambert 45-40, Chester-Joplin Inverness stopped Denton-Geyser-Stanford-Geraldine 50-22, Grass Range-Winnett topped Jordan 56-13, and Power-Dutton-Brady edged Absarokee 28-27.

This week, C-J-I hosts Lincoln and Grass Range-Winnett entertains Power-Dutton-Brady in the semifinals.

In the 8-Man playoffs, Fort Benton beat Ennis 44-6, Sobey defeated St. Regis 66-24, Flint Creek got past Belt 44-32 and Circle upset Seeley-Swan 38-36.

Scobey hosts Fort Benton and Flint Creek entertains Circle in the 8-Man semifinals this week.

On the Class B 11-Man scene, Three Forks defeated Florence in Florence 28-20, Glasgow outscored Columbus 62-44, Manhattan stopped Malta 12-7 and Eureka got by Red Lodge 28-13.

Three Forks travels to Glasgow and Eureka to Manhattan in the State B 11-Man semifinals this week.

Probably not that big of a deal, but District 7B not playing a conference volleyball tournament while 6B did, may have hurt the 7B teams at the Western B divisional in Mission last week.

Most especially in the first round Thursday.

Without having played a match in two weeks – while 6B had held a one-day seeding tournament where all four district teams played two matches each last Saturday – the 7B teams struggled mightily out of the gate. Seeded No. 2 out of 7B, the Thompson Falls Lady Hawks lost to 6B’s No. 3 Anaconda Copperheads, while 7B compatriots Plains and Mission lost to Florence and Loyola, respectively, in the first round.

District7B’s No. 1 seed, Eureka barely survived a five-set match with 6B’s No. 4 Deer Lodge Wardens, falling behind two sets to none before clawing their way back to win in five sets. The No. 2 6B team, the Loyola Breakers then beat the Lions in the second round.

To be honest, the 6B teams are all very good and deserving, but is the current system really fair to all teams in the Western B division? With District 6B seemingly getting more quality matches in than District 7B?

It doesn’t seem fair to this observer, looking at it from the outside. 

Plains coach Kim Lakko sees it from her perspective on the inside as a 7B coach. 

“I do feel that our side of the division was at a disadvantage,” she said. “One can understand why the other side of the division had a district (tournament) it makes sense as they have a larger pool of teams. However, it should be the same on both sides of the division because ultimately it is less games for our side as well as a lost opportunity to work any tournament jitters out.”

Another insider, Thompson Falls coach Sandra Kazmierczak largely agreed. 

“Experience makes a difference,” she said. “If the other conference is getting more games in, and tournament-type games at that, then that is to their benefit on that side.”