After the fall athletic season ended, Flathead High was the only AA high school to finish in the top four in all six sports, placing FHS number three in the running for the annual Great Falls Tribune All-Sports Trophy.
Flathead's 42.5 points trails only Helena Capital's 49, and front-runner Bozeman's 55 points.
All-Sports trophy points are tallied on a 25-20-15-10 system for the first four places in the major sports of football, basketball, wrestling and track, and on a 12-9-6-3 system in minor sports such as cross-country, swimming, golf, and tennis.
The All Sports Trophy "was started to honor overall excellence in high school athletics," said Mike Towne, the Tribune sports writer who has covered the award for the past 15 years. "It's interesting to see which schools do well in all of the sports."
In the fall, Flathead won girls cross-country, took second in boys' soccer, third in boys' cross-country and fourth in girls' basketball and soccer. The Braves football team shared third and fourth place for reaching the semifinals.
Flathead High, which has won the All-Sports trophy four times including 1989, 1991 and 1995, needs to finish strong in the spring sports to be a factor at the end, said activities director Gene Boyle.
"We will have to do awfully well in the sports we've done traditionally well in," said Boyle referring to boys and girls track, boys' tennis and boys' golf.
Boyle attributes Flathead's winning tradition to the stability of the programs and the coaching. This stability encourages more kids to go out for a sport, said Boyle.
"I think we get better turnouts than most schools," said Boyle. "Even though we're a big school, we have a small- school attitude."