Lake City girls win first regional title in 12 years
The person responsible for raising the baskets less than a minute after the Lake City girls basketball team captured the 5A Region I championship Tuesday must be forgiven.
After all, it had been 12 years since a Lake City team had won a regional title.
LC coach Bryan Kelly asked his principal to lower the baskets so his players could enjoy cutting down the nets after a 42-31 victory over visiting Post Falls.
It’s the first regional title for the Timberwolves since 2003-04.
“I said ‘put those back down’,” Kelly said, smiling. “It’s been 12 years so you can understand they’re not used to it.”
LC (19-4) advances to state, Feb. 18-20 at Nampa.
Post Falls (13-10) turns around and plays host to Lewiston (15-7) in a loser-out game Thursday at 7. The winner moves on to a play-in game against the District III fifth-place team on Saturday to decide a state berth.
When the T-Wolves put the nets in the trophy case following the state tournament next week, they’ll look back fondly on league and regional titles made possible because of defense.
The third meeting between LC and Post Falls was similar to the two league games. All three were low scoring.
Some of that is because of defense and some of that is Kelly and Post Falls coach Marc Allert are good friends and know each other and the players so well.
LC junior Nina Carlson drew the assignment again of guarding her best friend, Melody Kempton. They play on the same club team.
Carlson, who got occasional help from freshman Bridget Rieken, limited Kempton to eight points on 4-of-5 shooting. Kempton usually gets 10 or more shots a game.
“They played harder, they were more aggressive and they took us out of some stuff that we wanted to do,” Allert said. “They’ve got the personnel to guard (Kempton). Nina does a good job on her by herself. She’s one of the few players around that athletically can play her straight up. And then they’ve got lots of help.”
Made shots were a bonus early as both teams started out tight.
Kelly thought his team might start slow.
“These girls have never been in this position in a big game,” Kelly said. “But they buckled down and in the second half defense was the key.”
Carlson agreed.
“I think everybody was a little amped up,” she said. “It happens to us sometimes.”
LC used a 10-3 surge to open the third quarter, and the T-Wolves got it to double digits early in the fourth period.
No player from either team scored in double figures. Carlson hit two big 3-pointers, finishing with nine points and five rebounds. Rieken led with nine rebounds. Sisters Olivia and Kate Maryon and Cierra Dvorak had three assists each.
“We just had extra heart and extra motivation,” Carlson said. “We just knew the other team wasn’t going to get the looks (shots) they wanted to get.”
Lewiston 49, Coeur d’Alene 35: Tied 29-29 after three quarters, the Bengals outscored the visiting Vikings (8-15) 20-9 in an elimination game. Freshman Kelly Horning led CdA with 20 points and Kayla Fagan added 13. Haylee Weeks led Lewiston with 14.
In loser-out games Thursday at Kellogg, Kootenai takes on Lakeside at 6 followed by Clark Fork meeting Genesis Prep at 7:30.