Kellogg, BF fall into consolations

MERIDIAN, Idaho – Players from District I teams in the State 3A basketball tournament must have felt like a short-armed kid trying for the brass ring on the merry-go-round on Thursday.

Both Bonners Ferry and Kellogg couldn’t find the play, shot or defensive stop to get over the hump inside the Meridian High School gymnasium. Now – after BF lost to defending champ Snake River 68-61, and Kellogg dropped its first-round game, 62-54 to Shelley – the Badgers and Wildcats will meet in a survival game at 12:15 p.m. PST today in Meridian.

“Our guys were trying,” Kellogg coach Kieth Finkbeiner said. “They gave their best effort.”

Kellogg was close, but held only a brief 31-30 lead for a few seconds in the first half. Meanwhile, BF could only lament its inability to hit key foul shots after it enjoyed two one-point leads against a school that has won three state titles since the start of the decade.

“That killed us,” Badgers coach Gordon Allured said. “You’ve got to make your free throws.”

Shelley 62, Kellogg 54: The game started out like a somewhat organized game of H-O-R-S-E as each team tried to out-do the other with fantastic long-range 3-pointers in the first quarter.

Shelley junior point guard Darryl Simons, one of the state’s finest 3A players, opened up with two silky 3-pointers and a couple of free throws in the first quarter to spark a 20-point performance.

“Their point guard, Darryl Simons, is a great player,” Finkbeiner said. “The scouting report on him is he’s really quick, and we wanted to give him a few feet so he couldn’t get a run on us.

“But we were too tentative. You still have to get your hands up against the shot.”

But after combining to score 41 points in the first 8 minutes, both teams settled into a game of “catch me if you can.” The Wildcats played the greyhound to Shelley’s mechanical dog-track pace rabbit.

“We just couldn’t get over the hump,” Finkbeiner said.

Kellogg made several runs at the Russets, though.

Jacob Conboy hit back-to-back 3-pointers to fuel an 8-0 spurt with which the Wildcats knotted the score at 23 early in the second quarter. Then Conboy gave Kellogg its only lead with the third of his four 3-pointers about minute before halftime.

But Andy Higham, who fired in three 3-pointers, laced a 3-pointer with 44 seconds remaining to lift Shelley to a 33-31 edge at the break.

Kellogg bolted out of the locker room for the third quarter much like it started the second. After Shelley increased its advantage to 37-31, Joey Sauer briefly took over the game for the Wildcats. He ignored foul trouble to score six straight points and single-handedly tie the game at 37 just 2:20 into the second half.

Sauer eventually would foul out.

“He has the capability to do that (take a game over), but it’s hard to do that consistently when you’re saddled with foul trouble,” Finkbeiner said.

The Russets answered with a 13-4 run to end the period with a 50-42 lead. Kellogg got within two points, 52-50, when Jacob Kagarise pulled off a nifty crossover on the way to a layup to cap an 8-2 run with 4:15 left.

But Shelley tightened its defense, and the Wildcats’ only basket the rest of the way came a minute later on Zach Zeigler’s bank shot.

“Shelley made plays when they had to,” Finkbeiner said. “They scored baskets when they had to.”

Snake River 68, Bonners Ferry 61: Even with Snake River losing 6-foot-3 senior post Trevor Lund to an apparent knee injury early in the second quarter, the Badgers were unable to get the rebounds necessary to make a run stick against the Panthers. Snake River sophomore Kyle Gelles, seldom used this season, made sure of that with 10 rebounds in relief of Lund.

“Rebounding is the key to transition, and we didn’t rebound,” Allured said. “If you don’t rebound, you can’t get out on the floor.”

The Badgers were outrebounded 40-32 in a loss the taste of which was made all the more bitter by the fact that BF committed just seven turnovers in 32 minutes – and only three during a crucial second half.

“If you came in and said we’d have seven turnovers and lose, I would have said, ‘You’re crazy,’ ” Allured said.

Snake River’s Cody Talbot (18 points) was one reason BF played catch-up even with a clean ball-handling game. The Badgers allowed the senior shooting guard to nail three 3-pointers with relative ease from the edge of the court.

“We defended (Marcus) Christensen (nine points) very well and (Ulises) Trejo (three points) very well,” Allured said. “But we left Talbot open way too much.”

Even with that defensive lapse, BF found itself in the ballgame, 59-53 with 2:19 left after a pair of Jesus Mendez foul shots ended a 7-0 run. Coming on the heels of Snake River’s 10-2 spurt, the rally showed the resiliency of the Badgers.

But Mendez’s sharpness at the line would be a rarity. The Badgers were 6 for 11 in the final 7 minutes.

With Bonners Ferry forced to foul, Snake River converted 7 of 10 free throws in the final 1:40.