MISSOULA — For a Montana State women’s basketball team that’s largely been led by its freshmen and sophomores this season, it was a junior who made the biggest impact Saturday against rival Montana at Dahlberg Arena.

Ella Johnson, playing in her 78th game with the Bobcats, scored 13 first-half points as Montana State opened up a 24-point lead in the second quarter. She finished with a career-high 17 points, and the Bobcats coasted to a 72-55 win to complete the regular-season sweep of the Lady Griz. MSU has now won five consecutive games in the series.

WATCH THE HIGHLIGHTS:

Montana State women overwhelm rival Montana, win 5th straight Brawl of the Wild matchup

“I thought (Johnson) was really attack-oriented,” MSU coach Tricia Binford said. “Sometimes when she catches the ball she’s looking to pass, and today she was looking to score.

“Her freshman year, we always made the joke … that in the first few weeks it was Ella ‘Don’t Shoot the Ball’ Johnson, and then about two months in, I’m like, you’re middle nickname is ‘Shoot the Ball’ Johnson. So, we’re trying to build off that and get her to shoot the ball. She’s got a really nice-looking shot, especially faced up, but she’s getting more aggressive, and I just felt like she was focusing on making right plays and being aggressive.”

With both teams struggling to generate offense in the opening minutes, Johnson scored on a layup that sparked an 11-0 run by the Bobcats. She also had a 3-pointer during the stretch, and Montana State ultimately led 21-7 at the end of the first quarter.

The Cats’ onslaught continued into the second, and they started the quarter outscoring the Lady Griz 13-3 to build a 34-10 lead — with Jamison Philip, Brianne Bailey and Johnson each making 3-pointers during the run.

Montana started to show some life midway through the period and cut the deficit to 34-22 following two 3s by Avery Waddington and two buckets by Kennedy Gillette. Taylee Chirrick and Johnson, though, answered with a pair of MSU 3-pointers to give momentum back to the Bobcats. They led 40-22 at halftime.

“Ella Johnson, especially, did such a good job of carrying them through that first half with some big shots in some moments,” Lady Griz coach Nate Harris said. “I thought her last 3 of the half after we had cut it to 12 — Taylee buries one and then for (Johnson) to have the big play on one end with the block and then kind of come back down into a trail 3 to make it an 18-point game, I thought that was a gigantic play.”

The margin stayed between 13 and 20 points the entirety of the second half, as Montana slowed the pace and neither team was able to sustain momentum. Addison Harris picked up the scoring for MSU, putting in 11 points after intermission, including a personal 6-0 run in the fourth quarter.

Harris, a sophomore, totaled 15 points, Chirrick added 14 and Philip had 11. Johnson added six rebounds, two blocks and two steals to her stat line.

Chirrick, another sophomore, swiped four steals, giving her 100 on the season after she had 113 last year. She’s just the second player in Montana State history with multiple 100-steal seasons. Liz Holz had three such seasons in the 1980s.

With five games remaining in the regular season, Chirrick, who is averaging 4.2 steals per game, has a shot at MSU’s single-season record of 124 steals set by Holz during the 1988-89 season. The Bobcats (18-6 overall, 11-2 Big Sky) are back at home next week to host Weber State on Thursday.

Montana State also saw the return of Brooke Fatupaito on Saturday. The junior guard had missed the past 17 games with an injury, but she played nearly 12 minutes against the Lady Griz and grabbed two rebounds.

“I thought her minutes were fantastic. She gives us great energy,” Binford said of Fatupaito, a Billings Skyview alum. “She’s actually one of our most vocal junior leaders, and it’s great to have her out there.”

Gillette led Montana with 12 points, and Waddington had 11. The Lady Griz (7-17, 4-9) have now lost four consecutive games and return to Dahlberg Arena to host Idaho State on Thursday.

Even this mild winter can close in on me like dark, imposing walls.

Unanticipated challenges rat-a-tatting at me from left field day after day keep me at the computer and stuck sorting out mental puzzles far more than I prefer.

Add dry wind, short days and the monotony of wintertime chores to the equation and it becomes a desperate need for some mountain time.

My friend, Colleen, said she felt the same way.

Driving along the Rocky Mountain Front is spectacular, but walking among those peaks and crevices eclipses all a drive can offer.

The day was warm and dry, with dense clouds floating high, offering a promise for snow but not really meaning it.

Perfect for a hike.

Neither Colleen nor I could remember the last time we hiked together, but both of us knew we needed to get rid of the Winter Drudgeries.

The white mountain peaks gleamed so we wondered whether we would find deep snow.

Reports from the Bynum area offered low odds so we headed that direction.

Frankly, we knew we could hike throughout most of Montana without worrying about snow. Our friends in the Midwest, the Carolinas and Florida are hogging it.

The well-worn trail pointed us into a canyon of high limestone walls, pine trees and mystery.

Fresh elk scat and pebbles tumbling down the talus told us we weren’t alone.

The trail dissipated, but our dogs found several paths for us to follow. Sometimes, they were the easiest paths and sometimes we found ourselves ducking under branches and tripping over logs.

That didn’t matter.

The scent of the pines mattered.

The stillness of the air mattered.

We didn’t even pretend we would quit talking, though.

The vents were open and words poured out.

Mostly mine.

Mountains do that to me.

Somehow, they expand time and space so my hunched shoulders straighten.

My clenched jaw loosens.

My eyes see colors and shapes that I missed yesterday.

The round glacial rocks provide a background for sharp-cornered, green and brown mineralized rocks.

Wizened sticks curve like horse heads – symbols I relate to, left over after their career of trading air particles.

Trilobite tunnels carve into ancient limestone.

These remind me of Nature’s systems creating the foundation for all life.

As we walk, I think about my brother’s advice: Remember to notice the little things.

He is right – beauty is in the lines in a leaf and the sparkle of an ice crystal.

Or maybe beauty is in the noticing.

The trail crisscrosses a dry creek bed, offering clues to the mystery in the canyon with each bend.

Then we discover a trickle of water tinkling over some rocks.

A little farther upstream, we skate across ice between boulders.

The sun turns the tops of gray limestone walls to that glorious yellow of wintertime angles.

Our cameras come out.

I realize I had stopped venting about life — I just couldn’t think of anything else to complain about.

Instead, we laugh – at ourselves, the dogs playing together, the ice we slip on – anything and everything.

Then we round the final corner of the box canyon.

The mystery of our natural world reveals itself in all its glory.

A waterfall cascades into an icy green pool, Nature’s masterpiece waiting for anyone who makes the effort to find it.

Once again, I am humbled by the awesome wonder of a place far older than humanity.

I don’t know how the mountains do this every single time I arrive, but I count on this gift that I seek when no other gift is enough.

Then I carry the mystery and wonder and power of the mountains back home, sustained for another day.

Lisa Schmidt raises grass-fed beef and lamb at the Graham Ranch near Conrad. Lisa can be reached at L.Schmidt@a-land-of-grass-ranch.com.

Even in the politically charged atmosphere and divided country, a routine U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing was charged and emotions ran high as Jeremy Carl, a resident of Bozeman, stood for questioning, as President Donald J. Trump’s nominee to become the Assistant Secretary of State for the United Nations and International Organizations.

If confirmed, Carl would spend much time focused on the U.N. and other world organizations, but during the hearing this week, senators from both parties blistered Carl for his views on “white culture,” comments that were described as “anti-Semitic” and a fringe social concept called “replacement theory;” just a fraction of his time was spent focused on international policies, instead questioning him on matters closer to home.

Carl, who has spent time in right-leaning academic institutions and think tanks, has a history of controversial statements centering on race, religion and gender, and was appointed by Republican Gov. Greg Gianforte to the board of Humanities Montana, over the protests of some cultural leaders.

Carl also served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in the first Trump administration.

In an explosive Senate hearing Thursday, the only two Republicans on the panel to speak for Carl were introductory remarks by both Idaho Sen. Jim Risch, the chairman, and Sen. Steve Daines, of Montana, whose comments noted they were both from Bozeman and both shared an admiration for former President Ronald Reagan. Meanwhile, Sen. John Curtis, a Republican from Utah, said he was not inclined to support Carl’s nomination after questioning.

During the roughly two-hour hearing, though three other nominees testified about their appointments to other positions, the bulk of the time was spent focused on Carl and his extensive social media posting, speeches and writings that blamed the Jews for victimhood, claimed that “white culture” was being erased, and that Jan. 6 protestors were treated worse than African-Americans during the Jim Crow era.

Carl’s answers to a barrage of questions ranged from doubling-down to apologizing to claiming that his comments were being taken out of context. At least three Democratic senators said they were dumbfounded that a person with Carl’s beliefs would even be nominated to serve as one of America’s highest-ranking representatives to the U.N., because of his views, which favor white culture and Christianity while discounting diversity.

Allegations of anti-Semitism

Even though Carl’s nomination would focus on international relations, much of the hearing focused on Carl’s extensive writings, and more than 1,000 posts to “X” (formerly Twitter) which U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-New Hampshire, said had been scrubbed.

“Mr. Carl, you have argued that feminism has led to a downfall in American society. You’ve written that the Civil Rights Act has warped our culture and that the United States should be a white, Christian nation,” Shaheen said. “You’ve written that a post-feminist America is one of the reasons for falling fertility and rapidly rising out-of-wedlock births.”

Shaheen, though, used an October 2024 appearance on a podcast, “Christian Ghetto,” to quote Carl’s words back to him:

“Jews have loved to play the victim. The Holocaust dominates so much of modern Jewish history. Jews love to see themselves as oppressed.”

“You continued to make anti-Semitic and racist comments even after your nomination was announced last year,” Shaheen said. “In this committee, we’ve heard from many nominees we don’t agree with, but since your nomination, you’ve tweeted more than 850 times, appeared on five podcasts and repeated this language. This is a pattern. So, how can the committee trust that you can represent the United States of America to the rest of the world in an unbiased manner, when you have taken no steps to restrain your conduct after the nomination?”

Carl replied that since he was nominated, he’s been working at the Claremont Institute, and that his job includes advocacy.

U.S. Sen. Jacky Rosen, a Democrat from Nevada, said that as the only synagogue president elected to the U.S. Senate, she was worried that an endorsement from the upper house of Congress would send a dangerous message that anti-Semitism should be tolerated.

“Mr. Carl’s vile and anti-Semitic threats are very real,” she said. “Some may try to excuse Mr. Carl’s remarks that they were taken out of context or that his own heritage (Carl has some Jewish ancestry, according to him) protects him from criticism. So let’s be clear: Identity does not excuse anti-Semitism. Identity doesn’t excuse racism. Identity does not excuse hateful rhetoric regardless of who said them. Words matter.

“To my colleagues that may consider voting in favor … understand what the vote signals — it tells America you’re willing to use your sacred vote not just to ignore but to endorse these hateful statements.”

Several senators read into the record or placed into the written records some of those statements, which included: “Hitler is always a convenient bad example.” Another that was referenced: “The Holocaust dominates so much of modern Jewish thinking today. Everyone has traumas in their past. How much are we going to relitigate them?”

Oppressed white race?

Two of the other prominent topics during Carl’s contentious hearing included theories that white people may be the most oppressed group in America, and a belief in a racially-based and unproven “great replacement theory” that holds that America is slowly and deliberately replacing white people of European descent with other ethnicities in America.

Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Connecticut, used one of Carl’s quotes as the starting point for his questioning: “Anti-white discrimination is the most pervasive and political salient form of racism today.”

“Do you believe that anti-white discrimination is more salient than discrimination faced by Blacks, Latinos, Muslims or other American groups?” Murphy asked.

Carl responded that since Trump took office a year ago, that has been changing quickly.

“Maybe you’ll suggest that everything is fine now. A year ago, were white Americans the most discriminated against group in America?” Murphy asked.

“This is my belief and I’m not running away from that. Of course, all races in different contexts can be subject to severe discrimination. But when we look at our legal structure, white Americans are very disenfranchised in overt ways. We see it in the Small Business Administration and other places,” Carl said.

“So your belief is that white Americans face more discrimination at least prior to the Trump administration fixing this than Black Americans,” Murphy asked.

“On average, that is correct,” Carl replied. “I am not running from that at all.”

Carl also has written about his concern that “white culture” is disappearing and being erased from America. Murphy asked for definitions of white culture as well as examples of the government erasing it.

“Anytime you have mass immigration, you’re going to have a change in cultures especially if they’re coming from culturally dissimilar backgrounds,” Carl said.

“What history is being erased?” Murphy asked.

“Things like going to a certain type of Christian church,” Carl said, giving examples of ethnic differences within Christianity, saying that white Christians worship differently than Chinese-American Christians or Black Christian churches.

As Murphy pressed Carl for more examples of white culture being erased, Carl suggested the recent “Super Bowl” halftime show, featuring American artist Bad Bunny performing in Spanish, was evidence.

“I’m not a racial nationalist. I’m a civic nationalist,” Carl said. “I am concerned with the common American culture that we had for sometime that through mass immigration Balkanizes and weakens us. I’m not running away from that comment, and I am not apologizing.”

U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine, a Democrat from Virginia, brought up references that Carl made, including that “whites are victims of cultural genocide.”

Sen. Cory Booker, a Democrat from New Jersey, said he was disturbed by Carl’s endorsement of the great replacement theory.

“Do you believe there is an active effort to replace Americans right now,” Booker asked.

“The Democratic Party through its policies has certainly shown signs of that,” Carl said.

Booker then referenced some of Carl’s writings about race in America, quoting Carl’s assessment of it as an “us versus them” situation.

“The only interpretation I can have is it’s white people against the others, which sounds deeply racist to me,” Booker said.  “Would America be weaker if it were, say, 40% Jewish?”

“Not in and of itself,” Carl replied.

“Why did you qualify that?” Booker asked.

“Unity, as President Trump has said, rather than diversity is a greater strength,” Carl said.

“Why not say it doesn’t matter what percentage of population is Jewish?” Booker said.

“One of my weaknesses as some have pointed out is sometimes taking an idea too far. I made some comments about minimizing the effects of the Holocaust that were absolutely wrong. I am not going to sit here and defend them,” Carl said.

Booker continued to push Carl about what other statements he’d rescind, but Carl pushed back saying he didn’t have all of them, while others needed context.

“We’re sending you into a very diverse world, and you can’t say unequivocally that it doesn’t matter what our racial heritage is. You say it matters what the racial makeup of America is. Do you believe it matters?” Booker asked.

“Senator, let me repeat what President Trump says,” Carl began.

“I don’t want you to echo what President Trump says. I want you to answer my question: Does it matter what the racial makeup of America is?” Booker asked.

“I stand on my comment,” Carl said.

“What’s your comment?” Booker said.

Carl then reiterated Trump’s stance on unity versus diversity.

“You think this country’s greatness depends upon its ethnic diversity as long as white people have more numbers. That does not sound like a nation with the belief that all people are created equal,” Booker said. “And equal before the eyes of God. It sounds like you have a racial hierarchy. There is no way for me to read this any other way. This is the United States of America. One nation under God, but you cut us up and divide us along racial lines.”

Carl tried to interject over Booker, “Respectfully.”

“You do not respect me — because of the color of my skin,” Booker said. “You have said that Juneteenth is a racial hustle so don’t come here and hustle me.”

Republican has questions

Curtis, the junior senator from Utah, said that he was concerned about Carl’s comments as they related to Israel, but was also concerned with other U.S. interests.

“You have said that the U.S. spends too much time and energy on Israel to the determent of our own national interests. Share with me what U.S. interests have been harmed by sustained American support of Israel,” Curtis asked.

In his response, Carl invoked his work with former Secretary of State George Shultz and Charlie Kirk, and said he wished the United Nations would “stop being anti-Semitic all the time.”

But Curtis also worried that Carl’s worldview may lead to more strained relationships with countries normally considered America’s allies. Curtis said that he has concerns about Carl’s nomination, which could split the GOP and doom Carl’s chances.

United Nations

Much of the State Department position engages with the United Nations, a body Carl criticized as being bloated and out-of-step with American priorities.

“I will work to advance this vision by holding the U.N. and international organizations accountable, promoting transparency and ensuring the U.S. taxpayers’ contributions to these organizations delivers tangible results that align with our national interest,” Carl said.

He called slain conservative personality Charlie Kirk a longtime supporter and champion, and referenced his close alliance with Kirk several times, at one point saying that virtually no America has championed Israel more than Kirk.

“As President Trump has said, the U.N. has potential, but needs renewed focus as it has strayed far beyond its original purpose of solving international disputes peacefully,” he said.

Carl praised Trump officials for demanding accountability and leading the U.S. back to its purpose, citing a recent reduction in budget by 15% and layoffs of nearly 3,000.

At other times, he criticized the U.N., characterizing it as a being a body of “global legislators” as well as “independent sources of moral, legal and political authority.”

“All too often our resources are used to support programs and agendas that do not fundamentally cater to our interests,” Carl said.

Praising Trump and the administration for withdrawing from 66 international organizations, he accused America’s allies of not voting with the U.S. at the United Nations and then “privately signaling their support.”

Jan. 6 vs. Jim Crow

Another contentious topic of the confirmation hearing centered around comments that Carl made in which he said that the participants in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection were treated worse than people during the institutional racism of Jim Crow laws in America.

Booker pointed out that Capitol Police Officer Brian Sicknick, who was injured and later died in the attack, was a New Jersey resident. Booker spoke of Black Americans being beaten, lynched and murdered because of Jim Crow policies.

“It’s shameful. Sir, you have no decency. You have no honor. You say inflammatory things because you think it will ingratiate you to those who are paying your salary and you sit here before me and try to wrap yourself in an American flag,” Booker said. “You disgraced the ideas that we all swear an oath to uphold.

“God, I pray for us if we let someone like you represent us before the diverse nations of this world.”

Though Booker’s time to speak was ending and the meeting was running longer than scheduled, Carl replied, “I deplore Jim Crow and I don’t agree with you characterization of my views.”

On Friday, Humanities Montana confirmed that Carl had resigned from the board on Sept. 18, 2025.

Also on Friday, the Daily Montanan reached out to Daines for comment about Carl’s nomination, and whether he supported Carl, since he introduced him to the committee. The Daily Montanan also asked Daines whether he agreed with Carl’s positions in the committee hearing.

The Daily Montanan did not receive any response.