THE FRONT ROW WITH JASON ELLIOTT: Big or small, Lapwai could play all day

Imagine a scenario where the top 48 teams, regardless of classification, advanced to the state high school basketball tournaments.

Get the guys from IdahoSports.com to do some kind of selection show on a Sunday afternoon where teams had to find out if they’d advanced or not.

Use the district/regional tournaments to get your automatic bids, then let the MaxPreps rankings do the rest.

Just take the top 48, regardless of classification, and see what happens.

AN ARGUMENT could be made that some 1A Division I or Division II schools couldn’t compete with the likes of the 5A schools, and there’s no way this could ever happen.

In the case of the Lapwai High boys basketball team, which finished 27-0 this season and won the 1A Division I title for the second straight year, you just never know.

Some around the state believed Lapwai might have been the best team in the state this year.

Period.

As for the players ...

“We do pay attention to that kind of stuff,” Lapwai senior Kross Taylor said last week, after playing in the boys state high school all-star game at North Idaho College. “It kind of fuels us. We see that people love us, love our game and we take that to heart. We got out on the court and we want to make sure they keep saying that about us.”

“We use it as encouragement,” Lapwai coach Zach Eastman said. “For someone to say nice things about you, you want to be humble about it, but it also makes you work harder. Every night, you’ve got something to prove.”

Lapwai beat Coeur d’Alene (76-68 on Dec. 18) and Lewiston (81-63 on Dec. 30), as well as St. Maries, the 2A runner-up, twice this season en route to the unbeaten season. Lapwai beat St. Maries 59-53 in St. Maries on Dec. 3, then again 86-56 on Feb. 8 at home.

“It’s been good games for us the last two years,” said St. Maries coach Bryan Chase, who coached the Lumberjacks to the 2A title in 2021. “We had a couple of chances to win that first game.”

Titus Yearout, a senior guard at Lapwai, has signed to play at Idaho. Taylor, the younger brother of Emmit Taylor III, who played at North Idaho College and Idaho State, is receiving interest from NIC as well.

“After this year, everyone seeing us go undefeated and going back-to-back, I think everyone is going to want to play us next year,” Kross Taylor said. “They’re going to want to prove our legacy wrong. But it will be fun to watch from afar.”

EASTMAN, in his third year at Lapwai, coached the Region team in last week's boys all-star game at NIC.

Lapwai has won nine boys basketball titles, stretching from the 2A (five), 1A (one) and 1A Division I (three) levels.

As for how it gets down according to Eastman ...

“I think it comes from our seniors,” Eastman said. “They’ve been doing this with me for the last three years. When you’ve got kids that are trained and know what to do, when you get to the games, it just comes naturally. The scoreboard, it just comes naturally to them. We don’t look at wins and losses.”

As for finishing unbeaten?

“I was telling people that I didn’t expect to win each game this year,” Eastman said. “But it didn’t surprise me. I told everyone that we might not win every game, but we’re going to be competitive against every team we play.”

When it comes to next season ...

“We’re trying to get games, but it’s hard,” Eastman said. “It’s hard for Lapwai to get games. We’ve got 16 regular season games within our (White Pine) conference alone. And with a Christmas tournament, that’s 19 games right there. With a Christmas tournament, you can get another two games, so that’s how we were able to play Coeur d’Alene and other high schools. We’re trying to venture out and try a couple things to make it exciting for our kids.”

Even if that means playing with the big schools.

“I think athletically, each of them can shoot it,” Chase said. “On paper, they could play with anyone. Anyone with some size could give them some fits. A team like Lake City could do that. But there’s not a lot of teams that I’d pick them to lose against. That’s for sure.”

As for playing in a tournament with those bigger schools ...

"I think we'd be competitive," Eastman said. "It would be a challenge against some of those other 5A schools like Lake City with their height and depth, but we'd battle with them. It would be a fun game for sure."

And yes, Lapwai can play.

No matter how big or small you are.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for The Press. He can be reached by telephone at 208-664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @JECdAPress.