Lake City tops Sandpoint
(Photo by DYLAN GREENE) Freshman Arie VanDenBerg looks to attack the Lake City defense Tuesday night at the SMS gym.
SANDPOINT — It wasn’t the Bulldogs night.
After Sandpoint was able to keep pace with Lake City in the first quarter, the Timberwolves used a 23-5 second quarter to capture a 61-38 win over the Bulldogs on Tuesday night.
It was a tough matchup for Sandpoint against the No. 8 ranked 5A team in the state.
“After a slow start [Lake City] started to get it together,” head coach Wade Engelson said, “and they were able to execute their stuff and get big shots at a higher level than we were, but I really like how our guys competed in the second half, I really liked our effort. It was the second quarter that did us in.”
It was a rough first half for Sandpoint. They couldn’t do anything right as the Timberwolves were swarming to the ball and making the Bulldogs earn every point they could get.
Every time Sandpoint tried to get something going on offense it was as if they ran into a brick wall. Shots from the outside weren’t falling, offensive rebounds were tough to come by and open looks were nonexistent.
For several straight possessions in the second quarter, it seemed like every time the Bulldogs brought the ball up the court Lake City freshman Kolton Mitchell was picking their pocket and taking a steal the other way for an easy layup. Mitchell finished with seven steals in the game.
It was tied 9-9 after the first quarter, but the Timberwolves offense exploded in the second quarter to take a 32-14 lead into halftime. Sandpoint had 14 turnovers in the first half.
The second half saw the Bulldogs younger players step up and help the team get going on both ends of the court. Freshmen Arie VanDenBerg, Parker Pettit, Rusty Lee and Colin Roos, and sophomore Jacob Eldridge all had an impact and allowed Sandpoint to trade blows with Lake City in the third quarter.
Seniors Will Treadaway and Brandon Casey also made their presence felt, battling for rebounds in the post and rolling to the basket to allow Sandpoint to get easy layups.
The Bulldogs fought the final 16 minutes but Lake City leaned on their strong first half en route to victory.
Casey led the Bulldogs with 9 points and six rebounds. Treadaway and Eldridge each added 6 and VanDenBerg and Colin Roos scored 5.
Mitchell led Lake City with 15 points.
Sandpoint (7-8) will now head to Lake City at 3 p.m. Saturday looking to avoid a season sweep to the Timberwolves.
Lake City 9 23 17 12 — 61
Sandpoint 9 5 16 8 — 38
LAKE CITY — Janke 5, Irvin 12, Kiesbuy 7, Spellman 2, Johnson 5, Hanson 9, Mitchell 15, Sundstrom 0, Meredith 6.
SANDPOINT — R. Roos 0, Banks 3, Niemela 2, Eldridge 6, VanDenBerg 5, Pettit 0, Lee 2, C. Roos 5, Treadaway 6, Casey 9.