Nic Gets Serious After Lackluster Start, Cards Roll By 69 Into Tourney Finals

So here was the North Idaho College men’s basketball team leading by 37 points at halftime - and Cardinals’ players were getting their ears chewed in the locker room.

Not because NIC was pummeling Mount Royal on Friday in the inaugural Cardinal Classic. But because a similar effort down the road would have resulted in NIC getting drilled by a Scenic West Athletic Conference opponent.

“They weren’t excited about playing the first 15 minutes,” NIC coach Rolly Williams said. “They got excited in that latter part (of the first half) because they started scoring.”

More accurately, NIC’s David Cunningham infused the excitement. In about 10 minutes of playing time, the freshman guard rang up 12 points, three steals, six assists and four 3-pointers.

NIC went on to a cozy 138-69 victory over the visitors from Calgary, Alberta, and Williams’ message apparently hit home as the Cardinals played crisply in the second half.

NIC’s 138 points equaled a school record set against East Kootenay in a 138-58 drubbing during the 1987-88 season.

NIC improved to 7-0 and moves into the championship game in Christianson Gym against Big Bend, a 67-65 winner over Napa (Calif.) Valley.

There’s a tripleheader today. NIC’s women (7-0), which lost sophomore guard Angie Dickson to a torn knee ligament, possibly for the season, in its last game, takes on Big Bend at 3 p.m. Mount Royal (9-7) faces Napa Valley (2-6) at 5:30, followed by NIC-Big Bend at 7:30.

“If we’d been playing on the road against some of the big dogs, we’d been down 20 and they would have buried us,” Williams said about the first half.

He’s probably right.

But even Williams was grinning over NIC’s 27-point outburst over the final 3 minutes of the first half, turning a 45-35 lead into a 72-37 margin.

Cunningham was the spark. He stole a pass that led to a Troy Thompson dunk. That was in the midst of an NIC flurry of points, causing the players and fans to scream and jump.

But not Cunningham, who immediately swiped another pass and fed Thompson for a layup by passing the ball cleverly off the backboard.

“Troy said, ‘Lay it off the glass,”’ said Cunningham, a Lapwai High grad who tried out unsuccessfully for the University of Washington team last year.

Cunningham had another steal with about 3 seconds left, calmly took a dribble or two and buried a 25-footer at the buzzer just before halftime.

A member of the Nez Perce Indian tribe, Cunningham was steered to NIC in part by former Card Felix McGowan. In fact, the two played together in a tournament in Wapato, Wash., last summer and Cunningham scored 43 points and McGowan 41 in the championship game.

Big Bend 67, Napa Valley 65

Big Bend (3-0) rallied from a 15-point deficit with 11 minutes to play on the silky shooting of Chad Stenberg (22 points, 19 in the second half) and Micah Sullivan (12 points).

Sullivan’s turnaround from 8 feet accounted for the winning bucket. Then he got lucky on the defensive end.

Instructed to take a swipe at the ball because Big Bend still had fouls to give before sending Napa Valley to the free-throw line, Sullivan appeared to get away with a reach-in foul, but was credited with a steal.

NIC 138, Mount Royal 69

MOUNT ROYAL Gedlaman 4-19 3-4 11, Korella 3-4 4-4 12, Nichol 1-6 0-1 2, Anderson 3-10 3-4 9, Spence 1-3 1-2 3, White 3-5 0-1 6, Skierka 2-4 3-4 7, Weis 5-8 3-6 13, Haycock 3-3 0-0 6, Beaton 0-1 0-1 0. Totals 25-63 17-27 69.

NORTH IDAHO Hall 3-6 0-0 7, Dial 1-3 3-4 5, Schultz 1-4 1-2 4, Helm 0-1 2-2 2, Cunningham 5-7 0-0 14, Stack 2-4 4-5 8, Thompson 11-21 4-6 26, Allen 4-6 0-0 9, Rapier 3-6 8-10 14, McCoy 5-8 6-7 19, Byrne 2-5 2-2 6, Barth 2-3 1-2 6, Robertson 4-8 0-1 9, Kruiswyk 1-3 0-2 2, Sanchez 3-4 0-0 7. Totals 47-89 31-43 138.

Halftime-NIC 72-37. 3-pointers-Mount Royal 2-13 (Korella 2-2, Gedlaman 0-3, Nichol 0-3, Spence 0-2, White 0-2, Weis 0-1), NIC 13-26 (Cunningham 4-5, McCoy 3-6, Schultz 1-2, Hall 1-3, Allen 1-2, Barth 1-2, Robertson 1-1, Sanchez 1-1, Thompson 0-1, Stack 0-1, Dial 0-2). Fouled out-Korella, Haycock. Technical fouls-none. Rebounds-Mount Royal 39 (Anderson 10), NIC 46 (Thompson, Byrne each had 7). Assists 17 (Gedlaman 6), NIC 33 (Hall 7).

, DataTimes