On guard in the blue and white

There was once a time when the Coeur d’Alene girls ran the state of basketball.

Then, just as quickly, the Vikings didn’t.

And that didn’t sit very well with a few players on the team.

“The first couple of years were tough,” said Tori Younker, a 5-foot-6 senior guard. “There was a lot of long nights after games and long bus rides home after games. There were some tears, and some good times, but coming into it now, we really remember those feelings and it really made us cherish those chances we have now.”

As freshmen, the Vikings — who also featured Jaelyn Brainard-Adams, Jaden Chavez and Emma Whiteman — inherited a losing streak in league that extended to 24 games. As sophomores, the Vikings broke that streak, then advanced to the regional championship game, but lost their next two and failed to advance to state.

“The first couple of years for me were just a lot of emotions,” said Chavez, a 5-4 senior guard. “I was really emotional the first couple of years. There was a lot of losing and we’re not the same team we are today. But those years were important, and I don’t think we’d be the same team without them. We just knew that we had to get into the gym every day. We were good enough to get to state and knew we could, but it was more about if we’d put in the time. And doing that really changed everything.”

Under coach Dale Poffenroth, Coeur d'Alene went to state 10 straight seasons (2005-14), bringing home a trophy each year, winning staet titles in 2008, ’09, ’10 and ’14, and finishing as runners-up in 2006, ’07, ’11 and ’13.

But five straight losing seasons followed, before Nicole Symons took over as head coach in 2019.

And the growth of those then-freshmen, plus the additions of now-junior Skylar Burke, and sophomore Madi Symons, has helped the Vikings to back-to-back regional titles.

“At the end of our sophomore year, we had a chance to get to a play-in game,” Younker said. “We ended up losing our coach the night before the game, so that was a tough one. Once we regrouped, we knew we had to start preparing for next year. After that game, we looked at each other and said we’re done losing. Having those pieces (Burke and Symons) come in helped, but we’ve really just tried to pull things together.”

Symons was an assistant when the girls were freshmen and sophomores.

“I think there was a lot of potential there, but I don’t think they realized it,” Symons said. “They didn’t have the foundational skills to be successful. When I took over, we just got back to the basics and worked on skill development. No matter what offense or defense we put in, they were able to execute with confidence because they had the skill with that. I think they just needed someone that understood them and would coach them in a way to make them the most productive and give us everything they had. I’ve been around most of the girls since they were little, and felt I knew them and their families, and what made them tick and what didn’t.”

Seniors Nakisha Matheson, a 5-9 guard, and Jayda Johnson, a 5-7 guard who transferred from Post Falls, have also seen time in the Viking rotation this year.

“We were still trying to get a feel for the varsity game,” said Whiteman, a 5-2 senior guard. “It was tough those first couple of years playing with other teams that were on another level within our league. We knew that if we put the work in, we could do something special with the group we had coming up. We just wanted to make the most out of our last two years, and think we’ve got a good shot at doing it.”

And while they might not be counted on to score — that’s on Burke and Madi Symons — they’re capable when called upon.

“Those two get a lot of headlines, and they’re well deserved,” Younker said of Burke and Symons. “When we see their names in the paper, it makes us so happy because we love them like sisters. It’s fun for us because we don’t get a lot of headlines, and that’s fine with us. But Jaelyn and Jaden, they’re unsung heroes for us for sure.”

For Brainard-Adams, it has been coach Symons’ focus on defense in the last two years that has helped her game grow.

“She’s always said that if you’re not having a good day on offense, or something else, to keep working on something else to make the team better,” said Brainard-Adams, a 5-7 guard. “I wasn’t having a good game on offense (against Lake City in regional title game), so I just dug in on defense and tried to do something there.”

“I’m a defensive coach, and always will be,” Nicole Symons said. “But when you get kids like Jaelyn and Jaden, that don’t put up huge numbers in the box score, and just dig in on defense and give everything they’ve got, that’s a big help. And then you’ve got Emma that comes in and can fly around on defense and can be sneaky on offense. They’ve really bought into what we want this program to be about. Defense isn’t something you’ve got to be talented at basketball-wise. But if you work and grind at it, everyone is capable of being a good defender if they’ve got the heart to do that. And these girls have. They’ve started us and we’ve been able to put the offensive pieces in this year. And it’s really helped us get better.”

In its state tournament opener in 2020, Coeur d’Alene lost 50-49 to defending champion Eagle. This year, Coeur d’Alene (18-1) opens against Boise (9-4) on Thursday at 10:30 a.m. PST at the Ford Idaho Center in Nampa.

“We really could have won that game (against Eagle),” Brainard-Adams said. “From that, we learned to play our hardest and work as a team.”

Some of those moments from the opener stuck with Younker through this season.

“We had some good stuff going in that game, but definitely should have done better,” Younker said. “We have pictures of us after that game, and they’re tough to look at because it brings back all those emotions from that game. It makes you really hungry for this season and not take anything for granted. With COVID, we’ve just tried to take it one game at a time and one day at a time. I think back to state, we have some good memories. But those bad ones really fueled our fire.”

Coeur d'Alene's only loss came to Thunder Ridge of Idaho Falls in overtime on Dec. 29 during a road trip to eastern Idaho. With wins by both Coeur d'Alene and Thunder Ridge on Thursday, they will meet in Friday's semifinals.

"Going down there and seeing that competition was good for us," Chavez said. "That loss was more about learning instead of the wins we had down there — just knowing we were in those games as any other team that was there."