Quick hits

Same games, high stakes

After working overtime for a pair of Greater Spokane League wins over North Central and Mt. Spokane, East Valley’s reward is to play them all over again.

This time there’s a berth in next week’s state-qualifying regional at stake.

The GSL’s three Class 3A schools begin their abbreviated district tournament tonight when the Knights (6-15) host the Indians (4-16) in the first round.

The victor advances against district top seed Mt. Spokane (9-11) Friday, and also qualifies for the regional that begins Tuesday.

“North Central is playing well right now, even if not in the win column,” said EV coach Steve Henderson.

“They were on fire last night against Mt. Spokane.”

NC lost its touch in the second quarter, when the Wildcats’ 23-9 advantage settled the outcome.

EV defeated NC 48-47 in overtime on Feb. 13, assuring it the first-round home-court advantage. Last Friday, in two overtimes, it won at Mt. Spokane 48-46.

“I guess we’re starting to play well at the right time,” Henderson said.

The Knights won three of their final six games, and scored 95 points against University in one of them. It took the latter two wins combined for them to duplicate those totals.

“We were giving up 30 points a game on turnovers,” Henderson said. “Once we started taking care of the ball, the defense got a lot better.”

Because the State 3A tournament is a week later than 4A, the coaches decided to stretch out their season by concluding it with the round-robin series of games.

It was merely a preview of things to come.

In district girls games, NC (0-20) is at Mt. Spokane (5-15) tonight and the winner travels to East Valley (7-13) Friday.

The regionals are a six-team event with the first two rounds, Tuesday and Thursday, at home sites.

2B or not to state

Four teams from the District 7/9 pool are already qualified for Spokane’s State 2B basketball tournament next week.

Four more, including two teams from St. George’s will find out if they’re going, following loser-out games Friday at Mt. Spokane and Mead.

Panorama and Bi-County League regular-season second-place boys teams St. George’s and Liberty square off at 6:45 p.m. at Mead for one berth.

Selkirk and DeSales play the same time, at Mt. Spokane, for the other.

The St. George’s girls face Lind-Ritzville at 5 p.m. at Mead for a berth, while DeSales plays Dayton for District 9’s single girls state berth.

DeSales was 21-0 before being upset 51-45 by Reardan (18-8) Monday on Brooke Ferderer‘s career-high 25 points.

The Liberty and Reardan girls, and the Republic and Northwest Christian boys are in.