Wampus Cats throttle Mullan, force coin toss to determine No. 1 seed to districts

MULLAN — Clark Fork boys basketball got some much needed revenge on Tuesday night.

After suffering a heartbreaking 57-56 loss to Mullan on their home court on Jan. 5, the Wampus Cats were eager to even the score with the Tigers, and they did.

Clark Fork routed league rival Mullan 63-32 thanks in part to a combined 45 points from senior Cameron Garcia and junior Sam Barnett.

The victory means both teams finish the season with a 1-1 record in North Star League. Kootenai opted out of playing sports this winter.

Now a coin flip will take place to determine who gets the No. 1 seed to districts and the right to host the 1A Division II District 1 championship game.

Head coach Heath Beason said his team was hungry for a win against the Tigers.

"We weren't playing around," he said. "We were tired of not playing four quarters and I wanted to make sure we stayed focus. These guys didn't talk on the bus, they didn't mess around and we had a really good week of practice."

The Wampus Cats pounced on the Tigers early and took a commanding 21-2 first-quarter lead. Clark Fork didn't slow down in the second and carried a 31-point advantage into halftime.

"They did have one player that was injured, but that wasn't going to change our strategy," Beason said. "Basically, we full-court pressed them and put the pedal to the medal all the way through."

The full-court press is something Beason has had in his arsenal all season, but the Wampus Cats didn't start utilizing it until recently. So far, it's been very effective for Clark Fork. Barnett had nine steals in the game and Garcia tallied six.

It also helped that Garcia and Barnett were lighting it up from outside early. The duo combined for seven 3-pointers in the first half.

Barnett finished with a career-high 24 points.

"Sam was on tonight," Beason said. "He did a lot of shooting in practice and he really wanted to step up tonight."

Garcia tallied 21 points, Antonio Mayorga had eight and Carter Sanroman poured in five.

"I'm really proud of these guys and the way that they stepped up on this one," Beason said about the win.

In the second and fourth quarter, Beason was able to get some JV players playing time and he said they did a good job of holding their own.

The Wampus Cats have really turned the corner over the past few games, but Beason said his team can't get complacent.

"We still have room for improvement," he said. "I don't want to think that we didn't make mistakes because we absolutely did."

Clark Fork had just four turnovers in the game.

The Wampus Cats (3-11, 1-1 NSL) head to Wallace at 7 p.m. Monday for their final regular season game. Clark Fork fell to the Miners 57-32 at home on Feb. 1.

Clark Fork 21 22 12 8 — 63

Mullan 2 10 8 12 — 32

CLARK FORK — Garcia 21, Ch. Sanroman 0, Reuter 3, Matteson 0, Ca. Sanroman 5, Mintken 0, Barnett 24, Howard 0, Mayorga 8, Shelton 0, Wade 2, Christofferson 0.

MULLAN — R. Trogden 16, Nelson 4, Lowman 0, Zingler 10, A. Trogden 0, Layton 2, Appiah 0, Houston 0, Knoll 0.