Lake City Tunes Up, Beats Lakeland 64-49

Lake City wanted to spread the playing time around in Tuesday night’s nonleague high school boys basketball game with Lakeland.

And the Timberwolves accomplished their mission in a 64-49 victory over a struggling Hawks team.

“We’ll take it,” Lake City coach Jim Winger said. “There’s nothing wrong with either team’s performance. It’s a good game for us in mid-week.”

The Timberwolves (6-3) used the game as a tuneup for Friday’s home Inland Empire League opener with rival Post Falls (8-1).

Lakeland (1-6) returns to Intermountain League play against Kellogg (6-2), a 63-56 loser at Post Falls on Tuesday.

“We’ve kinda been preparing for Post Falls,” Winger admitted. “We tried to come out and do our stuff. We wanted to get all the kids out there. We took whatever (the Hawks) threw out.”

Both sides were content to run halfcourt offenses in the first half.

Guard Bryan Kelly scored 10 of his team-high 16 points in the first quarter to help Lake City to a 19-6 lead.

But Lakeland surged to start the second quarter. A low-post basket from 6-foot-6 junior Doug Freed capped a 10-0 run that left the Hawks down 21-18 with 4:39 to go in the half.

That would be as close as Lakeland would get. The Timberwolves picked up two baskets apiece from Kelly and senior post Brian Russell in the last 2:05 for a 33-22 halftime cushion.

“I thought (the Timberwolves) showed just about as much patience as we did,” Lakeland coach Mike Bayley said. “Both teams wanted to play at that (slow) pace.

“We seemed to play well in spurts, but boy those times between spurts are absolutely horrid.”

The Lakeland lull continued in the third period, with the Timberwolves getting a boost from junior Scott Hoover, whose 3-point field goal at 55 seconds made it a 51-31 game.

The Hawks’ junior guard, Eric Singer, found his mark in the fourth quarter, scoring 12 of his game-high 19 points, including a pair of 3-pointers.

Reserve sophomore R.J. Reiswig came off the Lake City bench to counter for the Timberwolves with all seven of his points.

Hoover added 13 points and eight rebounds for Lake City, which got 11 points and seven rebounds from Russell.

Bill Anderson and Freed tossed in 12 and 10 points, respectively, for the Hawks.

Lake City 64, Lakeland 49

Lake City 19 14 18 13 - 64 Lakeland 6 16 9 18 - 49

LAKE CITY Thompson 9, Kelly 16, Keefer 0, Reiswig 7, Shaw 0, Wilson 4, Russell 11, Miller 2, Brumley 0, Hoover 13.

LAKELAND Noble 4, Kins 2, Bevacqua 0, Anderson 12, Singer 19, Thornton 0, Bierne 0, DeBoer 2, Freed 10, Eixenberger 0.