Lakeside boys, girls pull off upsets at districts

Lakeside is No. 3 no more.

The Eagles’ boys and girls basketball teams finished third during the regular season in the Northeast A League.

Saturday at Mead both finished second in the District 7A tournament.

The girls from Nine Mile Falls knocked off No. 2 seed Freeman, 49-46. The boys bounced co-champion Colfax, 56-44.

The Lakeside sweep sets up a doubleheader Tuesday in the first round of the District 6/7 1A regional tournament. The girls will host Tonasket; the boys host Chelan. Freeman’s girls travel to Brewster. Lakeside girls coach Jeff Pietz talked with his team before their game Saturday.

With a first-round home game on the line to the winner, the stakes were high.

“We talked about how Freeman had taken an emotional loss (Friday),” Pietz said. “And we talked about how we were coming off an emotional win and how we wanted to continue that.”

And his Eagles did.

“This is the toughest Class 1A league in the state and we talked about how all of these games help us get ready for the playoffs,” Pietz said. “The thing is, it’s awfully tough for a team to beat you four times in a row and that worked in our favor.”

The biggest key, both figuratively and literally, for the Eagles was a lesson they learned Friday.

Lakeside’s all-NEA first-team center, Kia Gibson, fouled out of the team’s game with Chewelah with more than four minutes remaining and Lakeside behind. The Eagles staged a comeback without their primary inside scoring threat.

“We’re a young team, especially in the backcourt,” Pietz said. “They figured out that they could win a big game without Kia, and that they could accomplish so much more with her.”

Gibson came through with 18 points, including six of the team’s final 13 points as the Eagles came back from a 42-36 deficit to take the lead in the final minute.

Kelli Tikker scored the go-ahead basket on a driving lay-up with 58.5 seconds left to make it 47-46, and Leslie Stillar added the cushion on a pair of free throws with 23.9 remaining.

Kelsey Raines and Carley Heinen both scored 13 points to lead Freeman, with senior Jennesa Miller adding another 12.

“One of our goals coming in was to host a first-round game,” Pietz said.

Girls district champion Colfax will host Cashmere in a first-round game Tuesday.

In the boys seeding game, Lakeside had the regular-season co-champion Colfax down by as many as 16 points in the first half.

Colfax guard Ben Aune scored back-to-back field goals to cut the Lakeside lead to 37-30 with 3:17 left in the third quarter, but the Eagles rallied to lead by 11 after three quarters, 41-30, and matched Colfax basket-for-basket through the final quarter.

Junior guard Leif Parcell paced the Eagles with a 16-point effort, and Colfax was led by Sylas Rohner’s 13 points.

The Bulldogs travel to face the loser of the North Central District championship game, either Tonasket or Brewster. The winner of that game hosts Cascade of Leavenworth, which eliminated Chewelah Saturday, 47-40 at Chelan.

•Rand Stevens scored a game-high 26 points and grabbed seven rebounds, leading Cascade to a 47-40 win over Chewelah in the District 6 Pigtail game in Chelan. The Kodiaks got out to a quick start, outscoring the Cougars 21-9 in the first quarter. Ryan Ross and Jordan Hoxie scored 11 points apiece to lead the Cougars (11-13), who are finished for the season.