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Polson Basketball Games, Practices Moved After Gym Damaged

Snow buildup causes parapet wall to collapse; Pirates will play games at Salish Kootenai College

By Andy Viano

Polson High School’s boys and girls basketball teams will play the rest of their home games this season at Salish Kootenai College after snow collapsed a non-bearing parapet wall at Linderman Elementary School on Saturday.

According to Polson Activities Director Jay Krantz, snow had been building behind the parapet wall in recent days and caused enough concern that the Pirates’ Friday games against Ronan were moved to Salish Kootenai College as a precaution. One day later, the wall was breached and Krantz said a “glacier” of snow poured into one of the locker rooms, which were unoccupied. As of Monday, engineers were still assessing the damage but advised Krantz to move all upcoming athletic contests to the college in nearby Pablo.

“(Salish Kootenai College has) just been fantastic to work with and it’s a beautiful venue down there,” Krantz said. “It just happened to work out that they were open the nights that we had home contests and they have graciously allowed us to hold our home contests there.”

The Pirates’ varsity teams typically play and practice at Linderman. Because of the damage, Krantz said practices will be moved to the middle school and high school gyms, and some teams will be forced to practice either earlier in the morning or later in the evening.

The girls return to action Friday against Stevensville at Salish Kootenai College. The boys’ next home game is Jan. 18 against Glacier.