CdA stuffs Borah
NAMPA, Idaho – Count Lindsay Stark as a believer now.
Before the season started, Coeur d’Alene High girls basketball coach Dale Poffenroth told the Vikings to expect to end up in the State 5A championship game.
That’s where Coeur d’Alene will finish its season after the Vikings played giant killer for a second straight night, avenging an early season blowout by stopping District III champ Borah 51-45 in the semifinals Friday at the Idaho Center.
The Vikings (19-5) will take on Centennial (22-3) tonight at 7 PST. The game will be carried live on Coeur d’Alene radio station KVNI (1080-AM) and also will be on a live gamestream on Idahosports.com.
It’s not that Stark doubted her coach. It’s just that she took sort of a wait-and-see stance.
“Now I really believe him,” Stark said. “I’m just so excited that we’re in the finals. That’s like unbelievable to me. With our young team and the fact that we haven’t been playing with each other for that long, it’s unbelievable where we are right now. I’m so proud of every single one of us.”
Centennial had an easy time in its semifinal, topping Highland 47-36.
Lake City (13-13) will play for fourth place as the Timberwolves bounced back to knock off Eagle 47-44 in a loser-out game. The Timberwolves will meet Boise (20-5), a 59-33 winner over Skyline, at 8:15 a.m. (PST). The game also will be carried live on KVNI.
Coeur d’Alene 51, Borah 45: As easy as it appeared for the Vikings to build a 13-point lead, it was nothing short of difficult for them when it came time to finish.
The Vikings brought a 30-20 lead into the second half. But all but three points of that advantage were wiped away in a mysterious third quarter that saw the Vikings suffer through their most difficult stretch at state.
Some of the Vikings’ troubles had to be attributed to Borah’s sticky man-to-man defense, a switch from a 2-3 zone in which CdA shot holes through in the first half.
Borah stayed in the man into the final quarter, and a rebound basket by Heidi Pincock gave the Lions a 42-41 lead with 6:26 to go.
But the Vikings, who made 6 of 11 3-point shots in the first half only to make 1 of 8 in the final two quarters, got a key 3-pointer from Stark, whose shot regained the lead at 44-42.
CdA led the rest of the way, and the final 3 minutes would prove to be unnecessarily dramatic.
Senior Jackie Lenz missed the front end of a one-and-one bonus with 51 seconds to go and Deanna Dotts did the same with 37 seconds remaining. Finally, Stark made both ends of a double bonus 5 seconds later and Dotts got 1 of 2 with 4 seconds to go.
For all those misses, the Vikings, who were drilled 48-24 by Borah in their second game of the season, will be running some lines this morning.
As the horn sounded, Poffenroth showed some rare emotion, pumping his fist twice and allowing a smile to break out across his face.
“Our freshmen have just grown up so much during the year,” Poffenroth said. “I knew they were solid kids coming in, but they’ve come a long, long ways.”
Lake City 47, Eagle 44: Timberwolves coach Darren Taylor didn’t flip any switches. There wasn’t an inspired halftime chat. There weren’t any strategic adjustments. Nothing magical that lit a fire under LC.
The biggest difference between LC on Friday and LC on Thursday is the Timberwolves played harder and under more control.
LC used a 9-0 spurt to open the second half to wrest control, rebounding from a 23-17 halftime deficit to take a 35-28 lead going into the fourth period.
“Coming out of halftime we just said, ‘You’ve got to punch them in the face right away,’ ” Taylor said, figuratively of course. “They were winning the game on the foul line, and we wanted to win the foul battle and we did. We went to the line and they didn’t in the second half. We became the aggressors on offense and just played good defense with our legs. That was the difference in the game.”
A 6-0 start to the fourth quarter gave LC its biggest lead at 41-28 with 5:42 to go.
Eagle didn’t quit. The Mustangs fought back closing within 43-40 when Kyle Lombardi hit a 3-pointer with 1:27 remaining.
LC panicked at times, but the T-Wolves made 4 of 6 free throws in the final 1:10 and had a couple of key defensive stops to stave off Eagle.
Junior post Riki Moreland, who shot 47 percent from the foul line in the regular season, stepped up against Eagle, making 10 of 16 to finish with a team-high 13 points.