Prep basketball win streak ends at 120

CHOTEAU, Mont. -- A Montana girls' basketball team lost Thursday night for the first time since the 2010 state championship game, snapping the nation's longest current winning streak at 120 games.

Fairfield fell 50-38 to Class B rival Choteau, which rallied from a seven-point second-half deficit to end the longest streak in Montana high school history.

"All good things must come to an end," said Fairfield coach Dustin Gordon, according to the Great Falls Tribune.

Fairfield's streak was the sixth-longest girls' basketball winning streak in the history of the National Federation of State High School Associations -- and the longest since Duncanville, Texas, won 134 games from 1987 to '91.

Only two prep boys' basketball streaks were longer: Passaic, N.J. (159) and Valdosta, Georgia, Christian (129).

Baskin, Louisiana, holds the top spot overall with 218 consecutive games from 1947 to '53.

Choteau coach John Shepherd said he told his players to act like they had been there before.

"That's hard when you haven't been there before," he added, according to the Tribune.

"It was about time that we stopped that," Choteau senior Hannah Bowers told the newspaper.

Fairfield (16-1) has won four straight state championships since its previous loss -- and six of the past seven titles.

Jill Barta, a freshman on Gonzaga's women's basketball team, was one of four seniors last year who never lost a game with Fairfield, winning 104.

"Mainly we just kind of joked around with each other to make us feel better," Fairfield point guard Allie Steinbach told the Tribune after the players regrouped in the locker room. "We just came out as a team."

Shepherd predicted he would never see such a streak again, while Gordon described the experience as "weird."

"The whole thing has been weird," Gordon said, according to the Tribune. "Three or four years from now, looking back, I'll go, 'Wow!' It's been cool. It's been alright. I'm anxious for you guys [the media] to quit coming to our practice every day, quit coming to our games every time, and just refocus on what's important. And that's winning state."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.