Frontier Conference announces 2026 All-Tournament basketball teams

The Frontier Conference announced Wednesday its 2026 men’s and women’s postseason basketball All-Tournament teams. Each squad featured five of the event’s most valuable athletes. Montana Tech (women’s) and Rocky Mountain College (men’s) earned tournament championships at the Butte Civic Center.

Orediggers sophomore Brooke Badovinac, hero of Tech’s first tournament title since 1983, highlighted the women’s team. Frontier MVP Tabor Teel for league regular-season titlist Dakota State was also listed. Bailee Sayler, Frontier Sixth Player of the Year, Tech senior Liv Wangerin, and MSU-Northern sniper Becky Melcher rounded out the squad.

Rocky’s Omari Nesbit, who banked home a game-winning 60-footer against Tech in the tournament semifinals, was joined by Battlin’ Bears teammate Royce Robinson on the men’s team. Frontier co-6th Player of the Year Luke Holecek and second-team All-League pick Austin Ramos represented the upset-minded Lights. As the No. 7 seed, Northern advanced to the title game, pushing No. 1 Rocky to overtime. Tech stalwart freshman Asher Williams completed the Frontier men’s All-Tournament team.

Matt Stepan (Montana Tech Director of Athletics), Paul Panisko (Montana Tech Associate Athletic Director), John Thatcher (former Montana & Frontier player, coach), Brandon Stinson (Rocky Mountain College Sports Information Director), Nick Huntimer (Dakota State & Frontier Sports Information Director), and Mark Robertson (Montana Tech Associate Athletic Director) voted on athlete representation.

Badovinac averaged 13.7 points, 7.3 rebounds, 1.7 assists, 3.3 steals and 1.3 blocks per game during Tech’s tournament championship run. With 20.8 seconds remaining in the title game, Badovinac buried a go-ahead 3-pointer, then game-sealing free throws with 3.6 ticks on the clock. Teel scored 26 points in Dakota State’s tournament semifinal victory over Northern.

Sayler averaged 20 points in Western’s two tournament contests. She narrowly missed a double-double in the Bulldogs’ quarterfinal victory over Carroll College. Wangerin supplied an 18-point, 10-rebound double-double against Providence in the quarterfinals. She doled out five assists in the semifinals, then scored 16 points in the championship. Melcher dropped 30 points, on the strength of seven made triples, in Northern’s quarterfinal triumph over Rocky. She added 11 rebounds, totaling five boards and five assists in the semifinals.

Nesbit averaged 22 points, 5.3 rebounds, 2 assists and 1 steal per game, helping Rocky capture its first Frontier Tournament title since 2014. The final three of Nesbit’s 26 points appeared on SportsCenter’s Top 10 plays, an over-the-shoulder buzzer-beating heave that extended Rocky’s now 18-game win streak. Robinson finished 13-for-21 from the field for 29 points in the tournament title game Monday. Robinson knocked down 15 apiece in Rocky’s quarterfinal and semifinal victories, giving him a 19.7 per-game tournament scoring average.

Holecek scored 17 points in the tournament title game. He doled out three assists in Northern’s semifinal upset of Carroll College. Holecek is the Frontier’s co-6th Player of the Year. Ramos averaged 17 points per game during the Frontier Tournament. He grabbed five rebounds and dished out three assists in the championship game. Ramos, who averaged 14.3 points for Northern, was a second-team All-Frontier selection. Williams formed the remaining half of the league’s co-6th Player of the Year honor. He knocked down three triples and totaled 21 points in Tech’s tournament semifinal heartbreaker. Williams averaged 19.5 points and 2.5 boards per game.

With the Frontier’s automatic postseason berths settled, teams discover seeding and game location Thursday during the NAIA’s Selection Show. Rocky’s men’s basketball team is hosting a 4-team, single-elimination opening round pod March 13-14. Dakota State’s women’s basketball team will do the same in Madison, South Dakota. Sixteen winners of respective pods advance to the final site in Kansas City, Missouri (men’s) and Sioux City, Iowa (women’s) March 19-24.

Up to nine Frontier teams (men’s and women’s) are positioned to qualify for postseason play.