Something that this area does a little differently when it comes to the sport of high school basketball is celebrate its upcoming graduating seniors.

For years, if players didn’t find themselves playing in the District 1 All-Star Game in Mullan, it was because they’d earned a spot in the Idaho Statewide All-Star Games at North Idaho College.

This year, thanks to the rapidly spreading coronavirus, there’s nothing to celebrate.

Not even close.

FRIDAY WAS, up until Thursday’s cancellation, supposed to be the 34th edition of the District 1 All-Star Game, made up of seniors from the 5A to 1A Division II classifications from the northern part of the state.

“It’s something that you always look forward to because it’s just seniors that go,” Post Falls guard Colby Gennett said. “It’s something that I’ve been looking forward to and have gone to watch the last few years. You never expect something like this will happen, and tried not to get my hopes up too much. I was a little down at first, but it’s for the best.”

Had the game been played, Gennett’s teammates included players from Mullan, Genesis Prep, Kellogg, Wallace, Clark Fork and North Idaho Christian.

“It was kind of a surprise, especially to have the Mullan game canceled,” Gennett said. “After hearing about the Spokane game, I didn’t know whether the Mullan or NIC game would be canceled.”

In the girls District 1 game, Post Falls guard Katie Fleming was slated to finish her high school career with fellow Trojans Kennedy LaFountaine, Laney Smith and Ali Carpenter, then play in the NIC game later today.

“It would have been fun to get to play one more game with all those seniors again,” said Fleming, whose team went 1-2 at the state 5A tournament last month. “We were all kind of looking forward to it. We’d talked about how much fun it was going to be, but it was kind of expected with everything that happened throughout the week.”

Gennett was also slated to play in an all-star game on Tuesday in Spokane pitting players from eastern Washington and North Idaho, but that was also canceled earlier in the week.

“There was a few guys that I’ve played against for years that I was going to be teammates with,” Gennett said of the Spokane game. “A few of my AAU friends play in Spokane I would have shared the court with for the first time since eighth grade. It would have been a good experience to play with them again and finish my senior year with that.”

THIS YEAR was to be the 17th annual Idaho Statewide All-Star Games at NIC.

Post Falls finished runner-up in the state 5A boys basketball tournament, losing to Borah. Austin Bolt, who was slated to play on the Region team, scored 35 points for the Lions.

“I talked to him a little bit after the game last Saturday,” Gennett said of Bolt, who has signed to play football at Boise State. “I just congratulated him, and he was a little busy after the game to give a real congrats to. I was looking forward to seeing him again. Just to be able to play against him again would have been awesome.”

Peyton McFarland — who has signed with Utah — was part of a Boise team that beat Post Falls 54-44 in the state 5A girls consolation championship. She was recently named Gatorade Player of the Year, and was scheduled to play in the NIC game today.

“There was a few kids from the Boise team that would have been good to play against,” said Fleming, who missed the majority of her junior year due to a torn left ACL. “I’ve played AAU basketball with Aubrey Avery (Lake City) and Melody Loutzenhiser (Lakeland), so it would have been fun to be on the same team with them again.”

WITH THEIR senior years winding down, both Gennett and Fleming were also expected to meet with some college coaches during the course of the next few weeks. Those meetings are now on hold.

“I had some talks about coming on visits during spring break that have been shut down,” Gennett said. “It’s complicated things a bit, and where it ends up, I’m not really positive about that yet. These games would have been a good time to come watch, but it definitely can’t happen now.”

“I’ve still had some contact with coaches on the phone,” Fleming said. “But the visits have kind of had to be paused right now. I had two or three coaches that were planning to come and watch the NIC game also.”

Gennett had planned to go watch some of the NCAA Tournament games in Spokane next week as well.

“This was the first year that I was really going to go to the games,” Gennett said. “I didn’t have any other basketball commitments in the way, so I could actually go and do it. I know a few of us students and our teachers are in the same boat because they wanted to go as well. It would have been awesome with the possibility of both Gonzaga men’s and women’s teams here in Spokane, but it will happen again.”

Both Trojan seniors are looking on the bright side of things.

“I was able to do something I haven’t been able to do and finished second at state,” Gennett said. “It was good to finish in the big game on Saturday, with a great group of guys. I couldn’t have asked for anything better to be honest.”

“We weren’t even expected to go to state,” Fleming said. “So making it that far really felt like a successful year.”

And it was definitely something to celebrate.

That is, when the time is right again.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d’Alene Press. He can be reached by telephone at (208) 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at jelliott@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @JECdAPress.