THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: Showcases, shot clocks and stuff

Lake City and Owyhee were expected to meet in the championship game of the state 5A high school boys basketball tournament last March.

As it turned out, the closest they got to meeting was tipping off seven hours apart in the first round at the Ford Idaho Center in Nampa.

Lake City, of course, was upset by Centennial in the first round at state, and played its next two tourney games in other gyms.

Meanwhile Owyhee, a first-year school in Meridian, won the state title, beating the team that upset Lake City.

Both teams will be in the same gym again Saturday, as part of a four-game event at North Idaho College called the Nike Northwest Invitational.

The event also includes Coeur d’Alene, which plays Foss at 2 p.m. Lake City, originally scheduled to play Garfield out of Seattle, will now face North Central of the Greater Spokane League at 4. Owyhee will play Rainier Beach of Seattle at 6.

Lapwai faces Lynden (Wash.) in the opener at noon.

According to organizers, games will be played with a 24-second shot clock. Admission is $10 for adults, $5 for students. All four games will be streamed on the NIC Athletics YouTube channel.

LAPWAI IS the two-time defending state 1A Division 1 champion — the second-smallest of the six classifications in Idaho — but is considered one of the best teams in Idaho.

Kase Wynott, Lapwai’s 6-foot-6 junior guard, dropped 40 on the 5A Post Falls Trojans on Tuesday night in Post Falls.

And Post Falls coach Mike McLean heaped plenty of praise on Wynott, who holds a scholarship offer from Montana State.

“He was going to miss it or make it; there was nothing we could do about it,” McLean said. “His game will transition right into college seamlessly. And he's good defensively: that’s what separates guys that are good on both ends.”

Owyhee, meanwhile, lost the reigning 5A All-Idaho Player of the Year, Jack Payne, who is at Colorado State.

But the rest of the key contributors from last year return, including junior guard Liam Campbell, who has numerous offers from Division I schools.

And the Storm added a point guard in Jayce Allen, a transfer from Skyview of Nampa.

TODD BITTERMAN.

Neal Pederson.

Evan Ratcliffe.

Normally, basketball officials are better off going through games anonymously.

But for the record, those were the three that worked the first high school basketball game in North Idaho played with a shot clock, the aforementioned Lapwai at Post Falls boys game.

And except for a couple of malfunctions, like the shot clock accidentally being reset, or not starting when it should — issues that happen in places where shot clocks have been used for decades — the game went off rather seamlessly.

There was a time or two where, mostly due to good defense by Lapwai, the crowd got into it as the shot clock ticked down on a Post Falls possession — something that would normally have never happened — and the Trojans had to find a way to get off a shot in time.

Without the clock, the Trojans would have just backed it out and started over.

Maybe change is OK after all.

“We might have broken through that myth tonight,” McLean said.

Washington has used a shot clock for years, so Idaho teams playing across the border play with a clock.

Post Falls is one of the few schools in North Idaho with shot clocks already in place. McLean said they’ll use them against any opponent who gives the OK, like in late December, when Meridian, Bishop Kelly and Eagle play Post Falls, Lake City and Coeur d’Alene.

When Post Falls asked Lapwai if the Wildcats wanted to use a shot clock, the answer came back … “absolutely.”

“I was excited that the first shot clock game in North Idaho was in our gym,” McLean said. “We try to do what’s best for kids, and this is best for kids.”

Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 208-664-8176, Ext. 2019, or via email at mnelke@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @CdAPressSports.