Vikings patch things up, earn return trip to state
MARK NELKE | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 12 years, 10 months AGO
<p>Coeur d'Alene High's Ty Higbie, right, gets tied up with Mitch Bevacqua from Lake City High as the balls bounces toward the baseline Friday in the second half of the Viking's 68-58 win over the T-wolves to secure their spot in the 5A state tournament.</p>
<p>Lake City High's Justin Pratt drives through the outreached arm of Joe Roletto from Coeur d'Alene High during the first half.</p>
Mark Nelke covers high school and North Idaho College sports, University of Idaho football and other local/regional sports as a writer, photographer, paginator and editor at the Coeur d’Alene Press. He has been at The Press since 1998 and sports editor since 2002. Before that, Mark was the one-man sports staff for 16 years at the Bonner County Daily Bee in Sandpoint. Earlier, he was sports editor for student newspapers at Spokane Falls Community College and Eastern Washington University. Mark enjoys the NCAA men's basketball tournament and wiener dogs — and not necessarily in that order. | February 25, 2012 8:00 PM
COEUR d'ALENE - Coeur d'Alene High got the leak stopped in time - literally - and hit some big shots down the stretch Friday night to secure a return trip to the state 5A boys basketball tournament.
Deon Watson scored 22 points and the Vikings made nine 3-pointers en route to a 68-58 victory over the visiting Lake City Timberwolves in the second-place game of the Region 1 tournament before an estimated 1,400 at Elmer Jordan Court.
“We are glad that Lake City and Post Falls started (playing zone) against us back in January,” Coeur d’Alene coach Kent Leiss said. “It’s given us a chance to work on our zone attack, and getting some extra shots up. So we’re glad we had the struggles we had at the end of the year, because it helped prepare us for the tournament.”
Coeur d’Alene (16-6) will open vs. Borah (22-1) of Boise next Thursday at 12:15 p.m. PST in the first round at state at the Idaho Center in Nampa. Borah beat Mountain View (16-7) 51-44 on Friday night to win the District 3 championship.
Lake City finished 14-9.
Coeur d’Alene bounced back from a 47-41 loss to Post Falls in Tuesday night’s regional title game, which was moved to North Idaho College when a leak was discovered in the roof of Coeur d’Alene High’s gym right before tipoff.
On Friday night, much of the moving was done by the Vikings, who harassed the Timberwolves on defense and pushed the pace once they got the ball.
“We played with a lot of energy,” Leiss said. “We wanted to make the game fast. I wouldn’t say it was a fast-paced game, but I would say that it was faster than the two games that we played with Lake City that were very close. And we’ve been working hard on our offense the last couple of weeks, and we’ve done a ton of extra 3-point shooting.”
Unlike the case in Tuesday night’s loss, the Vikings gave Watson some scoring help on Friday. Ty Higbie added 16 points, and Joe Roletto hit four 3-pointers and finished with 14 points. Roletto hit two 3s and scored eight points in the first quarter as Coeur d’Alene took a 15-10 lead. Watson and Chad Chalich each had seven rebounds.
“Ty had been struggling for about a month, and I really challenged him to step up and he did,” Leiss said. “Most of the game he gave us great defense, and he gave us 16 points.”
Still, Lake City, with just two seniors on the roster (one of them a starter), wouldn’t go away. Coeur d’Alene led by as many as 12 in the first half, but Lake City pulled within 41-36 late in the third quarter.
However, the Vikings responded with a 16-4 run over the next five minutes to regain control with a 57-40 advantage. Lake City clawed back within seven points, but Coeur d’Alene had enough of a cushion to survive some shaky free-throw shooting. The Vikings missed 6 of 8 in one stretch in the fourth quarter, and finished 15 of 27 from the line.
Kyle Guice had 16 points, 10 rebounds and four blocked shots for Lake City. Riley Moreen added 15 points, Mitch Bevacqua 12 for the T-Wolves, who shot 23 of 41 (56.1 percent) from the field.
“I thought we just worked our tails off,” Lake City coach Jim Winger said. “It was a combination of things — they really hurt us rebounding, and then we’d work our butts off on defense, and they’d hit a big shot. Tons of credit to them; every time we made a run — and it was a different kid a lot of times. That’s why they’re a great team. ... I sure was real proud of our effort all the way around.”
Lake City 10 11 15 22 — 58
Coeur d’Alene 15 15 14 24 — 68
LAKE CITY — Traverse 0, Pratt 0, Bevacqua 12, Ness 7, Moreen 15, Guice 16, Winger 8.
COEUR d’ALENE — Tackett 0, Roletto 14, Chalich 8, Loy 6, Higbie 16, Watson 22, Blakley 2.
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“The whole process has been completely amazing,” said Nathan Williams, now in his fourth season as the Badgers boys basketball coach. “And the parents … it’s an hour and a half to Spokane, Coeur d’Alene, when we’d play an AAU game, and an hour and a half back, and there were so many times there was 6, 8 inches of snow. And we’ve got a game at 8 a.m. They’d always schedule us at 8 a.m., coming from Bonners. So we’re waking up at 5 … it was crazy. But the commitment from the parents and the kids has been amazing.”