WWCC women No. 1! Men No. 4!
It was an exciting winter for Walla Walla Community College basketball fans.
It came to a successful end Tuesday during the final session of the NWAACC Championships at the Toyota Center in Kennewick.
The women claimed the WWCC program’s first title in nearly a decade with a hard-fought, 75-72 victory over Eastern Region rival Yakima Valley while the men earned fourth place by downing Mt. Hood, 71-66.
While the women rolled in their opening-round contest and followed it up with three gut-check triumphs, the men showed heart and grit in winning their final two games after being humiliated by Lower Columbia on Sunday.
What a ride it was! Congratulations to the coaches – Bobbi Hazeltine and Jeff Reinland – and the athletes for making the 2009-10 campaign one that WWCC fans will remember for a long, long time.
Battle tested
Battle tested is a phrase that could apply to any high school team that qualifies for a state tournament.
The phrase certainly applies to our area basketball teams who will be competing in state-championship contests this week.
Routes to extending seasons varied – from reaching a district championship game by winning the first two games in the tournament to qualify for state, to having to travel 300-plus miles to play in a game that would decide a berth in the final eight, to qualifying for state with victories in two, or perhaps three, loser-out contests.
This success suggests that area fans might witness their teams ending seasons with state trophies by the conclusion of the weekend. After all, they will be going in battle tested.
Good luck at state!
Wa-Hi boys heading to Tacoma
The opening rounds of both the Big Nine District and 4A Regional basketball tournaments were not kind to the Wa-Hi boys basketball team.
The Blue Devils, champions of the Big Nine’s Cascade Division, were upset at home by Kamiakin before earning the district’s No. 3 seed to the regional tourney with a pair of victories.
The week that just concluded unfolded in similar fashion. Wa-Hi lost in the opening round of regional play at Gonzaga Prep on Tuesday.
That disappointment was followed by triumphs in Kennewick over a pair of league foes – Eisenhower on Friday and Kamiakin on Saturday – that earned the Blue Devils a berth in next week’s Class 4A state tournament in the Tacoma Dome.
Congrats to coach John Golden and his band of Blue Devils, who shook off poor first impressions to punch their ticket to Tacoma.
Zags Rule
The Gonzaga University men’s and women’s basketball teams both embraced common threads Thursday night.
Both were overwhelming winners in West Coast Conference games with Santa Clara. The men prevailed in Spokane while the women came away victorious on the road.
GU’s men captured a share of the program’s 10th straight WCC regular-season championship. The women have now won six league titles in succession.
The outstanding play of these two teams has made it another winter to remember in Spokane. Should the high level of play continue, it could make for a fun and exciting March for the Zags and their fans.
W-P headed to state
Kudos to the Waitsburg-Prescott boys basketball team.
W-P secured a berth in Saturday’s championship game of the Southeast 2B District 9 boys basketball tournment and punched its ticket to next week’s Class 2B state tourney with a 53-46 triumph over Garfield-Palouse on Monday night at Whitman College.
Waitsburg-Prescott’s victory provided partial proof that Southeast 2B South Division teams have stepped up in this postseason.
More proof was provided when Liberty Christian downed Walla Walla Valley Academy on Monday to set up a showdown with W-P on Saturday.
Further evidence came this past Saturday when DeSales rallied from a 10-point deficit late in the fourth quarter to eliminate Tekoa-Oakesdale.
Kudos to Waitsburg-Prescott. One more district game, then it’s on to state.
Kudos to Liberty Christian for similar success.
Kudos to WWVA, despite Monday’s setback, and DeSales. Still very much alive.
Another typical weekend in the Pac-10
It was the best of times and the worst of times for our state’s Pac-10 men’s basketball teams over the weekend.
On Thursday, both Washington and Washington State were defeated by the visiting L.A. schools. The Huskies let a winnable game slip away to USC and the Cougars were manhandled by UCLA.
Saturday offered better results for the Cougs and Dawgs. Washington State gutted out a win over Southern Cal while Washington came within a trey of hitting the century mark in a rout the Bruins.
These four ball clubs enforced something this weekend that Pac-10 fans have been witnessing all season long. That being a theory that the only thing predictable about this year’s conference play has been its unpredictability.
Warriors hot, hot, hot!
An argument can be made that the hottest teams in the NWAACC basketball ranks these days both reside in Walla Walla.
Both the Warrior men and women will be participating in the NWAACC tournament next month in Kennewick.
Each team sports an impressive winning streak heading into Eastern Region contests on Saturday at Big Bend.
The women are in a virtual tie for first place in the region and extended their winning streak to eight games on Wednesday by fending off stubborn Spokane, 65-64, in the Dietrich Dome.
The men won their sixth straight contest on Wednesday – downing CCS 79-55 to pull into a second-place tie with the Sasquatch in the East standings, just one game behind Big Bend.
Wins on Saturday would further enhance the league championship aspirations for both teams. That fact alone should make for an interesting Saturday of basketball in Moses Lake.
Touchet boys survive
It isn’t how you start, but how you finish.
Some of the time.
The Touchet boys basketball team proved on Monday that you can win by starting and finishing strong during a loser-out game in the Southeast 1B District boys basketball tournament in Endicott.
The Indians led Lacrosse-Washtucna, 17-9, after one quarter, and had to rally in both the fourth quarter and overtime to post a 56-49 triumph.
After the productive first period, Touchet scored just 13 points in the middle two frames. It led by one, 26-25, at halftime and trailed by five, 35-30, at the end of the third quarter.
A free throw in the final minute tied the game at 45-45 and sent the contest into overtime.
In the extra session, it was all Indians.
The Touchet Indians started strong and finished strong on Monday. As a result, they will live to play another day.
Weston-McEwen boys a pleasant surprise
Weston-McEwen’s Blue Mountain Conference boys basketball victory over Stanfield on Friday night in Athena by a final count of 78-74 completed what some would regard as an improbable regular season.
That is if one based its reaction on pre-season expectations.
The TigerScots were picked to finish in the bottom third of the BMC in the coaches’ pre-season poll.
Weston-McEwen has done its part to silence the critics over the past three months. It finished second in the conference with a 12-2 record and will take a 15-9 overall mark into this weekend’s district tournament at the Pendleton Convention Center.
The TigerScots will oppose Stanfield at 2:45 on Friday, with the winner earning a berth in the Oregon Class 2A state playoffs and the right to face regular-season champion Heppner for the district championship.
Congratulations to coach Brian Pickard and his team for a tremendous regular season. Good luck at district!
What a difference a few weeks made
Just a few weeks ago, many NFL experts proclaimed the New York Giants were the league’s best team.
Others delivered similar accolades the Denver Broncos’ way.
And with good reason.
The Giants started the year 5-0 while the Broncos jumped out to a 6-0 start.
Who would have thought that the former team would be eliminated from playoff contention just a couple of days after Christmas and the latter would suffer a similar fate a week later?
What makes this astonishing is the way it happened.
With their playoff future hanging in the balance, the Giants laid an egg against Carolina on Dec.27, 41-9, before dropping their regular-season finale on Sunday at Minnesota, 44-7.
Denver did not do itself any favors down the stretch by losing at home to AFC West rivals Oakland and Kansas City.
The Giants and Broncos went south in the final two-thirds of the season – from the NFL’s elite to playoff pretenders.
What a difference a few weeks made.
