T-Wolves hoping to learn from defeat
By JOEL DONOFRIO
Staff writer
COEUR d’ALENE — Before sportswriters take on their New Year resolutions, here are two clichés: The scoreboard doesn’t lie, and there’s no such thing as a moral victory.
Lake City basketball coach Jim Winger probably agrees with both of those statements ... but he also believes his young Timberwolf team can learn from Saturday morning’s 53-34 loss to Columbia River on the final day of the 2018 Lake City Invitational.
“Even though it was more of a lopsided loss on the scoreboard, I thought we did a better job (Saturday) than we did last night (Friday’s 66-63 overtime loss to South Kitsap),” Winger said. “We struggled on offense, but defensively we did a better job. (Columbia River) is a very talented team and they shot it well today.”
The Timberwolves (1-8) used a zone defense to hang with the Chieftains for most of the first quarter, shutting down their inside game and forcing them to fire away from outside.
Ben Janke’s drive through the lane pulled Lake City within 11-10 six minutes into the game ... but from that point, Columbia River (7-2) went on an 17-0 run over the next 10 minutes. The visitors from southwest Washington led 28-13 at intermission, and opened the lead to 43-19 late in the third quarter on a drive to the basket by Chieftains standout Evan Dirksen (21 points, six rebounds). At that point, Columbia River coach David Long emptied his bench.
“I think our shot selection was really good,” Long said. “If you give good shooters good looks, you’re going to be successful.
“On defense, we’re not the kind of team that can use pressure all game long, but we try and surprise teams with it. We try to use half-court traps when they’re not expected, and that worked for us today.”
Columbia River forced 15 T-Wolf turnovers, and held Lake City to 12-for-37 shooting from the floor (32.4 percent). Caden Dezort (11 points) had three of the Chieftains’ six 3-pointers.
Long has brought a team to Lake City’s holiday tournament for seven years, and said the long drive is worth it for the hospitality, officiating (including the lack of a shot clock) and the chance to face different competition.
“Even though we lost our first game (58-54 to Post Falls), I’m happy with how we played this week. Even in that game, I liked the shots we took, we just couldn’t make enough of ’em.”
Winger also was pleased overall with his team’s performance in the tournament, including an opening-game win over Mead despite the loss of starting point guard Chris Irvin to injury the previous week. Winger said the 6-foot-3 sophomore broke his foot in practice — “a fluky thing” — and will miss the rest of the season.
In his place, several Lake City players took their turns directing the offense, and Winger saw some encouraging results.
“This was a good week for us — last year (the tournament) got us going, so maybe it will this year, too,” he said. “I wanted Columbia River on our schedule because they do a lot of things to challenge teams, and it was good for us to face that.”
Jack Kiesbuy had 10 points and six rebounds for Lake City, which hosts Cheney High on Wednesday night. Senior post Josh Stellflug added eight points and five rebounds, while Seth Hanson also had eight points for Lake City.
Columbia River 13 15 17 8 — 53
Lake City 10 3 8 13 — 34
COLUMBIA RIVER — Snook 6, Miller 0, Dirksen 21, Dezort 11, Armstrong 4, Asplund 0, Kukula 2, Valdez 3, Cartwright 0, Delich 4, Hairston 2, Miranda 0.
LAKE CITY — Stellflug 0, Janke 2, Kiesbuy 10, Spellman 1, Hanson 8, Brum 4, Sundstrom 0, Sallis 1.
Coeur d’Alene 63
Mead 59
Connor King lead three Vikings in double figures with 14 points in a victory over the Panthers to cap a 2-1 finish in the Lake City Invitational.
Kale Edwards scored 13 points and Drew Hostetter 12 points for Coeur d’Alene (7-3), which outscored Mead 17-14 in the fourth quarter to pull away.
“Our scoring has been pretty balanced lately, which is good,” Coeur d’Alene coach Tony Hanna said. “They pressed us the entire game, and we had a lot of turnovers. But we did the same thing to them. They got up on us, but we did a good job of keeping our composure. It was really close the entire way.”
Coeur d’Alene hosts Lakeland on Jan. 8.
Mead 19 14 12 14 — 59
Coeur d’Alene 19 16 11 17 — 63
MEAD — Baird 14, Sloan 4, Wrenn 2, Rogalette 7, Mulder 3, Shoff 10, Russell 0, McKee 0, Wenkheimer 8, Reighard 5, Allen 6.
COEUR d’ALENE — Whittaker 7, Johnson 8, Friesz 4, King 14, Hostetter 12, Margo 5, Edwards 13.
Post Falls 55
North Central 50
Colby Gennett had 15 points, seven rebounds, four assists and four 3-pointers for the Trojans in a win over the Indians to cap a 3-0 finish at the Lake City Invitational.
Gavven Desjarlais had 12 points and seven rebounds for Post Falls, which trailed 34-25 at halftime before outscoring North Central 30-16 in the second half.
“We did not play a good first quarter,” Post Falls coach Mike McLean said. “We scored a lot of points, but gave up 20, which is unacceptable for what we’re trying to do defensively. We fell into the trap of rushing shots, and in the second half, our pressure was much better and we did a good job of taking away the things they were successful with in the first half.”
Post Falls travels to Glacier High of Kalispell, Mont., on Friday.
Post Falls 17 8 19 11 — 55
North Central 20 14 11 5 — 50
POST FALLS — Gennett 15, Hauser 0, C. Rutherford 3, Ballew 10, Shields 2, Desjarlais 12, Horning 7, J. Rutherford 3, Mitchell 3.
NORTH CENTRAL — Stone 5, Edwards 3, Niel 4, Rice 10, Clifford 0, Knight 8, Sayers 20.
- In Saturday’s opening game, Kentridge won its second game at the tournament with a 71-57 victory over South Kitsap. Jett Briceno led the Chargers (9-3) with 18 points, while D’Ante Ward scored 19 points for the Wolves (3-4).