It's all fun for Lakeland girls at state
Boise is not your usual winter tourist destination.
And yet…
A lot of high school basketball players will be thrilled with a visit over the next three weeks.
There is nothing quite like a state tournament to get the adrenaline going and give you tingles when your team is introduced.
Now here’s an absolute fact…
Nobody, and I mean nobody, will have more fun in the Boise area this week than the Lakeland High girls.
Who needs a bus?
These kids probably could have danced all the way to the Treasure Valley.
See, the neatest thing in the world for a prep athlete is to qualify for a state tournament when, truthfully, it really wasn’t exactly a lock when the season tipped off.
Or in Lakeland’s case, when you lost more games than you won (10-11).
But there they are, at the state tournament, and for the rest of these girls’ lives, nobody will ever be able to take that away.
IT’S FAIR to say that Lakeland is not considered in the picture to actually win the 4A title.
They open festivities Thursday night at Boise’s Timberline High with a 6:15 MST bout against Caldwell (20-5), and normally you’d say, hey, at least Caldwell isn’t a district champion.
No, because that’s because they play in a conference and district with Middleton (21-2), the second-ranked team in the state.
Three of Caldwell’s losses came at the hands of Middleton, including a 38-30 defeat in the district title game — so Caldwell’s record is a bit deceiving.
But hey, what the heck?
Give it a shot.
When you haven’t been to state in a decade, this is the stuff of grins and laughs and just having a hoot throughout the whole experience.
Look, winning the state championship is pretty much the realm of consistent contenders.
Timberlake has a legitimate shot in 3A, Lake City could win in 5A if the girls can clear the hurdle presented by Mountain View, and Genesis Prep could scramble to the 1A Division II title.
THOSE TEAMS will feel pressure.
In Timberlake’s situation, the goal is to return to the winner’s circle after losing to Sugar-Salem in last year’s semifinals — with state title trophies sitting back in Spirit Lake from the two previous years.
But Lakeland?
Nah.
The kids can just go play.
They’ll have a great time with every second of it.
If and when they get knocked out, even the bus ride home won’t be gloomy.
The Lakeland girls might as well be going to Disneyland. It’s going to be fun from start to finish.
I promise you that, despite a hurry-up scouting session from Coach Steve Seymour, the girls won’t much know or care about Caldwell.
Even where it is.
They’re just going to go play some basketball, hopefully shooting better than they did to win the district title over Moscow (14 of 43 from the field and 12 for 28 from the free-throw line).
Here’s a prediction: Lakeland actually will play better, even if the girls can’t conquer Caldwell.
Heck, the pressure is off.
Lakeland’s at state, and every one of these girls will remember it forever.
With wide, lasting smiles.
Steve Cameron’s “Cheap Seats” columns for The Press appear on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. He also contributes the “Zags Tracker” package on Gonzaga basketball each Tuesday.
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Email: scameron@cdapress.com