STATE 1A DIVISION I BOYS BASKETBALL TOURNAMENT: Lakeside battles back for third

By MARK NELKE

Sports editor

CALDWELL — It was hard enough for the Lakeside Knights to bounce back on Friday afternoon, after suffering a tough semifinal loss the night before.

And then, to have to play an extra four minutes when they thought they had things wrapped up in regulation.

But Lakeside, led by senior Jayson “JJ” Hall’s 32 points, came through on both counts, beating Grace 67-63 in overtime in the third-place game of the state 1A Division I boys basketball tournament at Vallivue High.

“We had a tough time getting up for this game,” said Lakeside coach James Twoteeth, whose team lost 63-53 to Riverstone of Boise in the semifinals. “We were so let down, because we should have been playing in the finals. So you could tell in the first half their defense wasn’t there, their energy level wasn’t there. It took us probably 2 1/2 quarters to try to play a little bit.”

Sophomore Vander Brown totaled 23 points and 13 rebounds for Lakeside (16-5). He scored the final four points of the game, including a cutback with 50 seconds left to break a 63-all tie.

The Knights were hoping to go back-to-back, albeit in a different classification this year. Lakeside returned most of its players from last year’s 24-0 squad that won the program’s first state title since 1997.

“It’s a trophy; it’s hardware,” Hall said.

“It means a lot, bringing home a trophy with my seniors,” said senior guard Kenyon Spotted Horse, who finished with nine points on Friday after a 30-point, 12-rebound effort in the semis. Spotted Horse picked up his fourth foul on a charging call with 2:29 left in the third quarter, but after a brief sitting, remained on the court the rest of the game.

“Honestly, third place is not what you want, but we struggled in transition, and couldn’t hit our shots the first and second quarter,” Brown said. “But the third and fourth quarter we picked up our defense, got some steals, finished on our breaks, and we were able to capitalize off of all their mistakes, and grab a lead.”

Senior guard Gage Stoddard, who had scored 50 points in his team’s first two tournament games, led Grace (11-14) with 24 points on Friday, hitting 9 of 25 from the field, including 3 of 11 from 3-point range.

Ty Gilbert added 14 points for Grace, which committed 20 turnovers.

Lakeside missed nine of its first 10 shots, but was 26 of 51 the rest of the way.

Grace jumped out to an 8-0 lead, forcing Twoteeth to call a timeout less than 3 minutes into the game. Lakeside picked up its defensive pressure after that, and with runout after runout from the likes of Brown and Hall, Lakeside led 32-23 at the break led by Brown’s 15 points.

Brown’s three-point play with 35.9 seconds left in regulation put Lakeside up 59-57. Grace missed a pair of inside shots, and the rebound of the second miss went out of bounds to Lakeside with 10.7 seconds left.

Lakeside missed the front end of a one-and-one with 8.1 seconds left, got the ball back when Hall slapped the ball off Stoddard’s leg and out of bounds. But the Knights turned it back over with 6.4 seconds left.

Stoddard who had hit some deep 3s earlier in the game, brought the ball up against Hall, and was sizing up another deep 3 from some 35 feet out when Hall was called for a reaching foul with .6 seconds left.

Stoddard sank both free throws to force overtime tied at 59.

“I just got mad at myself for even reaching, and then I looked at the clock and there was like (.6) seconds left. And I realized that I shouldn’t have done that,” Hall said. “I had Vander guard him (in overtime).”

Stoddard did not score in overtime.

At 63-all, Spotted Horse drove to the basket and missed, then missed the putback. Brown rebounded and missed his follow, then grabbed his own miss and put it just over the rim and in for the go-ahead hoop.

After Grace missed a 3 and lost the rebounds, Hall kicked it ahead to Brown for the clinching basket with 20 seconds left.

Hall scored 21 of his 32 points in the second half and overtime, including several tough, contested jumpers from the left baseline.

“In the second and third quarter he was shooting and they weren’t going in so I took him out,” Twoteeth said. “He’s like, ‘Why am I coming out?’ I told him, ‘You just need to take a breather, and we’ll put you right back in.’

“It helped out, because he started making some shots.,” Twoteeth said. “Just that breather helped him out a little bit.”

Grace 15 8 22 14 4 — 63

Lakeside 15 17 13 14 8 — 67

GRACE — Stoddard 24, T. Draper 7, Gilbert 14, T. Andersen 6, P. Andersen 8, D. Draper 4, Reeves 0, Gibbs 0. Totals 21-52 15-20 63.

LAKESIDE — L. Matt 0, Brown 23, Abuan 0, SiJohn 0, Q. Hall 0, J. Hall 32, Nomee 0, Spotted Horse 9, Louie 0, C. Matt 3, Kee 0. Totals 27-61 9-14 67.