The Sentinel-Hellgate rivalry has been settled, for possibly the last crosstown game, between the schools for the season. At Dahlberg Arena, on February 11th, the Knights swept both the games with the girls’ score of 52-31 and the boys’ with a score of 45-32. Despite all of the upset fans chanting “We Still Love You,” the goat trophy wasn’t guaranteed to Hellgate. The competition had nothing to do with winning the game, just the spirit of the fans. Sentinel and Hellgate fans were both lined up at opposite ends of the court and the winner of the goat was announced with a spirit score of 438-412, the Knights won.

The Big Sky Eagles have recently shown their hurt for not being able to participate in the Golden Goat. Sentinel and Hellgate heard their concern and made it so they will play the winner (the Knights) of the Golden Goat in 2023. The next Golden Goat that Sentinel will be participating in is the 2024 Golden Goat against either the Eagles or the Knights. It was crucial that Sentinel won this year, but there will always be another year to finally win the goat.

Sentinel did show up for the halftime performances, despite the outcome of the score. Both the Sentinel Cheer Team and the Sentinel Dance Team performed two superb performances including the Sentinel Pep Band, Sparty, students, parents, and Sentinel staff. The performances included outfit changes, shark attacks, a basketball hoop made of people, and so much more! They were beachy, to say the least.

The student section also delivered with various positive chants including “We Want Gertie” and limited the number of negative chants of booing, or a crowd favorite “Let’s Play Football.” There were various meetings throughout the past weeks to ensure no negativity at the games. Because of the meetings, the negative chanting was sparse, so the Sentinel student section was doing everything right. The lack of points that were awarded to Sentinel was shocking because the amount of encouragement was equally as apparent when compared to the Knights. The reasoning behind Sentinel not winning the goat trophy is unknown.

Sentinel has yet to win the Golden Goat. After a couple of years of competition, Sentinel hasn’t taken the trophy home. After losing the goat for so many years, the tone of the arena was somber instead of frustrated. The junior class will not see a goat game their senior year, which is a hard fact to swallow for the class of ‘23. Until the next Golden Goat with Sentinel in 2024, Sentinel will have a lot of time to prepare the halftimes, cheers, a theme, and a stronger spirit. Even if Sentinel lost the trophy and the games, we still need to cheer on our Spartan basketball teams into divisions and hopefully state. We love our Spartans!