Vikings Surprise T-Wolves

The Lake City High boys basketball team can’t shrug off its 60-56 loss to crosstown rival Coeur d’Alene as a game it had nothing to play for Wednesday.

Lake City had many incentives, even though it had already secured the top seed in the regional tournament.

Consider a couple:

The Timberwolves were still contending for the Border League title.

The Timberwolves were riding a 12-game winning streak.

Which makes CdA’s upset all the more impressive.

The Vikings popped the Timberwolves’ balloon, and in so doing, Coeur d’Alene kept its hopes for a home regional game alive before a vocal crowd of 1,400 at Viking Gym.

CdA continued a second-half surge in league that has seen the Vikings defeat all of their Inland Empire League foes. They improved to 9-10 overall, 7-10 in league. LC suffered just its third loss, dropping to 15-3 and 13-3.

CdA led by 17 points in the second and third quarters. And the Viks seemingly just had to play out the final 3:47 leading 56-43 for the big win.

The final 3 minutes must have seemed as long as 30 minutes, as far as the Viks are concerned.

CdA committed six turnovers in the frenetic finish, and LC used a 10-0 run to pull with 56-53 with a minute left.

LC had two 3-point attempts fall short before Sam Conley, who played perhaps the game of his life, pulled down a key rebound. Conley was fouled immediately.

Conley made both ends of the one-and-one with 21 seconds remaining. But the drama was far from over.

Daryl Wilder hit a 3-pointer seconds later to cut the lead to 58-56, and LC called timeout with 12 seconds showing on the clock.

A long in-bounds pass by Nate Alderman sailed out of bounds with no apparent intended target.

“That wasn’t the play we called,” CdA coach Larry Bieber stressed. “I don’t know what Nate was thinking. We wanted to get the ball to our best free-throw shooters because we knew they’d had to try to foul.”

With the ball under its own basket, LC had a chance to tie. But Kevin Quinn’s one-handed runner across the key missed and Conley rebounded and was fouled.

Conley, who scored a game-high 23 points, hit both free throws with 5 seconds left to secure the victory.

“I’m more proud of him defensively,” Bieber said of Conley, who limited LC’s leading scorer Matt Dlouhy to two points through three quarters, seven for the game. “I knew he could do that offensively.”

Bieber wasn’t pleased, though, with his team’s finish.

“We went brain dead at the end,” Bieber said. “It was like a deer in the head lights out there in the fourth quarter.”

LC coach Jim Winger saw a similar image for more than three quarters.

“A lot of people say I talk too much, but I’m at a lack of words,” Winger said. “For 3 quarters I have no idea where we were mentally. There are not a lot of explanations. If you can’t be mentally there playing your rival and if you win out you win the Border League … I don’t know what you need for (motivation). As a group, we didn’t have a clue for 3 quarters.”

CdA is playing the way Bieber envisioned after sitting down with his team at the halfway mark of the season.

“We said in the second half we wanted to beat all the Idaho teams and we have,” Bieber said. “To a kid I asked if they believed we could do it. They said yes. So I asked them to start dedicating themselves to it.”

Bieber wasn’t surprised his team couldn’t finish LC off earlier.

“We had them on the ropes, but that shows the character of Lake City,” Bieber said.

CdA finishes regular-season play Friday when it entertains Clarkston. LC will be home that night against Sandpoint before finishing at Lewiston.

Coeur d’Alene 60, Lake City 56

Lake City 8 16 11 21 - 56

Coeur d’Alene 15 16 16 13 - 60

Lake City (15-3, 13-3) - Longwell 2 1-1 5, Quinn 7 0-0 14, Dlouhy 2 2-2 7, Lenz 2 3-6 8, Hammons 2 0-0 6, Chisholm 3 0-0 7, Wilder 3 0-0 9, Anderson 0 0-1 0, Carper 0 0-0 0, Dennis 0 0-0 0. Totals 21 6-10 56.

Coeur d’Alene (9-10, 7-10) - Simon 0 0-1 0, Rupp 1 0-0 2, Bligh 2 0-0 6, Rogers 3 2-2 10, Wilkey 1 1-2 3, Sather 0 0-0 0, Conley 6 7-8 23, Findley 4 2-5 10, Alderman 3 0-0 6. Totals 20 12-18 60.

3-point goals - Wilder 3, Hammons 2, Lenz, Dlouhy, Chisholm, Bligh 2, Rogers 2, Conley 2. Total fouls - Lake City 18, Coeur d’Alene 16. Fouled out - Dennis. Technicals - none.

Sandpoint 43, Post Falls 38

Scott Evans made 4 of 9 3-pointers and the Bulldogs held off the Trojans after starting with an 11-0 lead.

Evans hit two 3-pointers in the third quarter to thwart the Trojans’ rally. Post Falls came within three points in the fourth quarter.

Sandpoint 11 9 13 10 - 43

Post Falls 6 9 10 13 - 38

Sandpoint (6-12, 5-11) - Evans 5 1-1 15, Mire 0 0-2 0, Mills 0 0-0 0, Malone 3 0-0 6, Gunter 3 4-6 10, Oliver 0 0-0 0, Lopshire 1 0-0 2, Rinaldi 4 2-2 10. Totals 16 7-11 43.

Post Falls (2-17, 0-17) - Smith 1 0-0 2, Fetters 5 1-2 12, McKinnon 4 1-2 10, Garrett 0 0-0 0, Hutchison 0 1-2 1, Ward 1 0-0 2, Da. Adams 2 0-0 6, De. Adams 0 0-0 0, Haas 2 0-0 5. Totals 15 3-6 38.

3-point goals - Evans 4, Fetters, McKinnon, Da. Adams 2, Haas. Total fouls - Sandpoint 8, Post Falls 10. Fouled out - None. Technicals - None.