| Pirates
split first two District games
The Prairie Pirates split their first two District tournament games as they beat Lapwai 61-42 Tuesday, Feb. 12 and then lost to Kamiah 61-68 Monday, Feb. 18. Both games were at the LCSC Activity Center in Lewiston. With Monday’s loss the Pirates were to play Clearwater Valley Tuesday, Feb. 19 in a loser-out game. If they won that they would play the Troy-Lapwai winner Friday, Feb. 22 at 7:30 p.m. The winner of that game would play Saturday, Feb. 23 at St. Maries against the District 1 champion, either Wallace or Lakeside, at 6 p.m. Prairie jumped out to a 7-2 lead as Tyler Hankerson scored 4 points but Lapwai came back to tie the game at 9-9. 
Marcus Higgins then drove to the hoop for a basket and converted the 3-point play to give Prairie the lead for good. Rhett Schlader added a free throw to make it 13-9 but a late turnover led to a buzzer-beating 3 by Lapwai and Priarie led just 13-12 after one quarter. The Pirates opened the second quarter with a 9-0 run with Higgins scoring 5 of those points. Lapwai came right back though taking advantage of some forced turnovers to pull back within 2, at 25-23, by halftime. A 10-3 run to open the third quarter put Prairie back on top by 9 with Lucas Arnzen connecting on a pair of midrange shots while Seth Chaffee drained a pair of 3-pointers. Prairie wound up outscoring the Wildcats 16-7 in the quarter to take a 41-30 lead into the fourth. In the fourth quarter Higgins connected on a 3-pointer to put Prairie up 46-32 but Lapwai still had a run in them as they were able to get back within 11 at 51-40 with 2:21 left. From that point on Prairie outscored Lapwai 10-2 with all the points from both sides coming at the free throw line. In a reversal of form for the Pirates against Lapwai this season the Pirates started out the game in their zone defense. In the regular season games Lapwai was able to solve their man-to-man and break out to a big lead each time only to see Prairie switch to the zone in the second half and come back to win. This time they were able to go to the man defense in the second half and pull away. Correspondingly Lapwai’s shooting percentage dropped as the game went on from 45% in the first quarter to 33% in the second to 13% in the third before bouncing back up to 31% in the fourth. Higgins led the scoring with 18 points with Arnzen adding 11, 8 in the second half. Hankerson scored 9 points filling in as a starter for Bruner who was able to play and score 7 points but was obviously not at 100%. Chaffee scored 7, all in the second half, with Schlader scoring 6 and Dan Wemhoff 2. A note about Wemhoff’s basket. He had just turned the ball over to Lapwai but followed that up by stealing the ball and going end to end for a 1-hander. Prairie held a 43-33 rebounding edge with Bruner grabbing 10 rebounds while Higgins and Schlader had 9 each while Hankerson and Arnzen had 7 each. Chaffee had 3 steals and Higgins had 3 assists. Prairie was 21 for 48 from the field, 44%, and 16 for 30 at the line, 53%. Lapwai was 16 for 55 from the field, 29%, and 6 for 18 at the line, 33%. Prairie 13 12 16 20 -61 Lapwai 12 11 7 12 -42 Prairie-Schlader 2-4, 2-4, 6; M. Higgins 5-8, 7-10, 18; Chaffee 3-13, 0-0, 8; Hankerson 4-6, 1-3, 9; Arnzen 5-7, 1-3, 11; Bruner 1-7, 5-6, 7; Wemhoff 1-2, 0-2, 2; J. Higgins 0-1, 0-0, 0; Ross 0-0, 0-0, 0; Bruegeman 0-1, 0-0, 0; Shears 0-0, 0-0, 0; Hinkelman 0-0, 0-0, 0; B. Higgins 0-0, 0-0, 0. 3-pointers-Chaffee 2, M. Higgins. Lapwai-Higheagle 2-6, 1-2, 5; Tannehill 1-8, 2-2, 5; Penney 0-2, 1-2, 1; Leighton 4-10, 0-0, 9; Greene 0-2, 0-0, 0; Payne 4-9, 0-3, 9; Perez 0-5, 0-0, 0; Chimburas 3-4, 1-5, 8; Williams 2-5, 0-2, 4; Bullock 0-2, 0-0, 0; Calkins 0-1, 0-0, 0; Williamson 0-0, 0-0, 0; Name unknown 0-0, 1-2, 1. 3-pointers-Tannehill, Leighton, Payne, Chimburas.  Kamiah
bounced back though with a 1-9 run to take a 17-19 lead by the end of the
quarter. A big shot in that run was a 3-pointer by Reed York, a harbinger
of things to come.
The second quarter was a disaster for Prairie as they went scoreless until the 2:45 mark when Schlader banked in an 8 footer. Those were the only Prairie points in a 2-15 run by Kamiah that lasted until the 1:00 mark. Included in that run were 3 more 3-pointers by York. A basket by Arnzen and a 3-pointer by Marcus Higgins let Prairie get back within 10 by halftime at 24-34. Prairie cut the lead down to 6 early in the third quarter on a pair of free throws by Hankerson and a driving lay-up by Higgins. Kamiah bounced back though and by the end of the quarter the margin was the same as it was at halftime, 10 points, 38-48. In the fourth Prairie was finally able to cut into the lead as a 15-7 run cut the lead down to just 2 at 53-55 with 2:01 to play. Higgins hit a pair of 3’s in that run while Schlader had a 3 and Arnzen a jumper from the elbow. Higgins and Chaffee each added a pair of free throws. York broke the run with his sixth 3-pointer of the contest. He had a string of going 5 for 5 from beyond the arc. Prairie twice cut the lead back to 3 on another jumper by Arnzen from the elbow and on a pair of free throws by Higgins but couldn’t get a stop on the other end. The 7-point final margin was the biggest in the 3 games this season against Kamiah with the Pirates losing all three. Higgins put forth a great effort to keep Prairie in the game with 27 points which included seven 3-pointers. Arnzen added 11 points with Schlader scoring 9 and Chaffee and Hankerson 7 each. York led Kamiah with 22 while 6’9” Matt Munch added 21 and 6’4” Eric Hill 14. With Bruner inactive due to his collarbone injury Prairie had no one to match up inside with Hill and Munch. Kamiah held a 29-34 rebounding edge with Arnzen grabbing 7 to lead Prairie while Chaffee added 6. Chaffee also had 4 steals while Higgins had 4 assists. Prairie was 20 for 54 from the field, 37%, and 12 for 17 at the line, 71%. Kamiah was 23 for 45 from the field, 51%, and 16 for 25 at the line, 64%. Prairie is now 14-8 on the season. Prairie 17 7 14 23 -61 Kamiah 19 15 14 20 -68 Prairie-Schlader 4-10, 0-0, 9; Higgins 8-17, 4-5, 27; Chaffee 2-8, 2-2, 7; Hankerson 1-8, 5-9, 7; Arnzen 5-9, 1-2, 11; Wemhoff 0-0, 0-0, 0; Ross 0-0, 0-0, 0; Bruegeman 0-2, 0-0, 0. 3-pointers-Higgins 7, Schlader, Chaffee. Kamiah-E. Hill 4-8, 6-10, 14; York 7-12, 2-2, 22; K. Hill 2-4, 0-2, 4; Crane 1-7, 0-0, 2; Munch 7-9, 5-7, 21; Williamson 1-4, 3-3, 5; Kludt 0-0, 0-0, 0. 3-pointers-York 6.
PIRATES BOYS BASKETBALL SCHEDULE FOR 2012-13 *indicates league game 30-Nezperce, here, lost39-63 8-Genesee, there*, won 63-62 in overtime. 13-Lapwai, here*, won 70-59 14-Grangeville, there, Idaho County Shootout, lost 33-52 20-Potlatch, there*, won 64-29 27-Lapwai Tournament, beat Deary 55-43 28-Lapwai Tournament, TBA, beat Lakeside 67-47 29-Lapwai Tournament, TBA, beat Summit 71-50 12-Potlatch, here*, won 67-48 14-C.V., here*, won 66-48 18-Troy, here*, won 72-55 24-Genesee, here*, lost 40-53 25-Lapwai, there*, won 58-57 28-C.V., there*, lost 48-51 5-Kamiah, there*, lost 53-58 6-Nezperce, there, won 65-52 12, 18, 19, 21 & 22-District at LCSC, beat Lapwai 61-42, lost to Kamiah 61-68, lost to C.V. 45-46, season over, details next week. |
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