Back on the trail: Libby’s Tristan Andersen aims toward big finish

By his sophomore year Tristan Andersen could do it all for the Libby Loggers: throw the football, keep it, drive the hoop, rebound it.

He is the third of three Andersen boys, born to a pair of Libby High graduates, who excelled on the hardcourt. By his junior year he was leading the Loggers in scoring.

And on Feb. 1, 2025, he knew something was very wrong.

“It was really weird,” Libby basketball coach Josh Bean said. “We were playing Browning at home and he came over before the tip-off and said, ‘Coach, I don’t think I can go. My back is killing me.’ ”

There’s a medical term for what happened to Andersen’s back — Spondylolisthesis — but suffice to say it was a repetition injury.

“It was a stress fracture from repeatedly jumping and landing,” Andersen said. “it’s just repeated stress.”

The only way to get past it was physical rehabilitation while easing the load on his back. His basketball season was over.

“It was about four weeks into basketball and then I had to miss the last two months,” he said. “I did physical therapy through that period and the first month of my junior year of track.”

Kyle Hannah knew something was off during the 2024 football season.

“It was tender,” Hannah, who took over as head football that year, said. “It was a nagging injury. And basketball was kind of the final straw.”

But out of that setback, Andersen came back stronger than ever.

Well OK, not right away. Last spring, he said, he estimated he was at 85-90 percent of normal. Last fall Bean felt Andersen still wasn’t quite 100 percent, so he lightened the practice load and turned him loose on Friday nights.

“His playmaking ability puts him up there with anyone I’ve coached,” said Hannah, who was a Libby assistant for 16 seasons before taking over. “I’d put him up there with the Bakers, the Fullers, the Brumbaughs — back in ‘06 when we were making hay around here. He is as good as any of those kids.

“We ended this football season .500 and one game short of the playoffs, and that was mostly due to him being a dual-threat quarterback.”

Andersen gives credit where it is due: Brothers CJ and Tyler were excellent athletes and helped forge his competitive nature.

“I’ve always just been kind of that younger guy competing with my older siblings,” he said.

This is no better illustrated than last year’s State A track and field championships. He finished fifth in the javelin for a second straight year.

“For him to come back from that back injury and place as a junior is pretty special,” Bean said. “Now he has the No. 1 throw in Class A. And he’s healthy.”

Last fall, his third as Libby’s starter, he was second-team all-Northwest A at quarterback after throwing for 1,284 yards and rushing for 547.

He was also first-team, and All-State, at safety. Last basketball season he averaged 13.1 points and 6.2 rebounds. In 2024 he took second in the high jump at the State A meet.