No rest for the area hoops teams
It has been a little bit over a week since area high school and college students have been in the classroom during the holiday break.
That doesn’t mean that we haven’t learned a little bit in their absence.
ONE THING that came from last week’s Lake City Invitational is that the area 5A boys basketball teams have been tournament tested.
Post Falls, the lone unbeaten from last weekend, found a few different ways to get past Columbia River, Kentridge and North Central on consecutive days. The Trojans were also coming off a win in a tournament in Auburn Dec. 21-22, so they’ve started to get things going as they go on the road again this weekend for games in Kalispell, Mont.
Coeur d’Alene was just a slow start from posting an unbeaten mark in the tournament as well, falling to Kentridge on the first day before taking down Greater Spokane League schools North Central and Mead to improve to 2-1 on the season.
The Vikings will enjoy a little bit of a hiatus before visiting Lakeland next Tuesday. Maybe more importantly, they’ll also return home on Jan. 11 to Viking Court for the annual Fight for the Fish spirit game against crosstown rival Lake City.
The Timberwolves finished 1-2 in the tournament, beating Mead before losing to South Kitsap and Columbia River. Lake City could have beaten South Kistap, but fell in overtime.
In girls basketball, Lake City capped an unbeaten run through the Evergreen Christmas tournament with a 52-40 win over Burlington-Edison last Saturday in Vancouver, Wash. Lake City will be tested plenty in the coming weeks, with Central Valley coming to Coeur d’Alene on Jan. 19 for a Saturday afternoon game.
If nothing else, Lake City — seeing three different teams they didn’t know much about on consecutive days — could pay off in a few weeks should they advance to the state tournament.
A LITTLE later tonight, the North Idaho College men’s and women’s basketball teams will open Northwest Athletic Conference play with games against Big Bend in Moses Lake.
The Cardinal men went 2-1 in the Fiesta Bowl Junior College Shootout in Mesa, Ariz., losing 69-68 to tournament host Mesa last Thursday. NIC beat Snow — a former Scenic West Athletic Conference rival — and Seward County to improve to 11-2 on the season. NIC returns home to host Treasure Valley on Saturday at Rolly Williams Court.
NIC’s women open conference play 10-2 after winning the Lower Columbia College Holiday Classic on Saturday in Longview, Wash. It is the third time the Cardinals have won the tournament since the 2012-13 season.
NIC moved from the NJCAA’s Scenic West Athletic Conference to the NWAC following the 2015-16 season.
“It’s the first time we’ve started this early since we’ve been in the conference,” NIC women’s basketball coach Chris Carlson said. “We really haven’t started until the weekend game (NWAC teams play Wednesday, Saturday) and usually have had a bye that first night. Big Bend is really good, but I’m sure glad we got into this tournament.”
THERE IS still plenty of work to go for area teams, whether that be in conference or postseason play, and it will be a lot more difficult moving forward.
Then again, most of these teams want it that way.
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.