La Center boys race to 103-71 victory over Stevenson

LA CENTER — A first-time viewer might find the speed of the La Center boys basketball team disorienting.

To the Wildcats, it’s business as usual.

La Center pushed the ball early, trapped at half court and rarely used even half the shot clock to effectively wind sprint past Stevenson, 103-71, in a 1A Trico League showdown on Thursday night at La Center High School.

“We wanted to run them out of the gym,” Wildcat senior Avery Seter said.

It was the first of two meetings between two teams that are plenty familiar with one another and are destined to compete for a postseason spot in a month. And the game followed a Trico trend: fast-paced and high scoring.

La Center’s offensive mentality boils down to three words: “Go, go, go.”

“That’s all I’m yelling,” coach Jeremy Ecklund said. “Sometimes I run up the sideline with them. It helps that our guards have that mentality to get down the floor, we have some of the best ball handlers and they just fly.”

The Wildcats rarely reach the end of a shot clock, and push for a fast break at every opportunity. That mission hearkens back to a practice in November before the first game of the season. Ecklund brought them out to the track and the team ran a mile, followed by hill sprints, box jumps and stair running.

The kicker?

“I kicked their keesters and they never complained,” Ecklund said.

The fruits of that labor has been evident in the league-best 86.3 points per game — a figure that’s made possible by possessing four players who have scored 30 or more points in a game this season.

“How do you match that up? It’s fun basketball,” Ecklund said. “Fun to watch.”

And in the locker room postgame on Thursday night, Ecklund told the team they would need to be in even better shape if they wanted to make a run at state, where teams play as many as three games in three days. The players nodded along in agreement.

La Center scored 32 points in the first quarter and led by as many as 20 in the second quarter. Matt Bryant had 18 of his 29 points in the first half after going 5 of 10 from 3-point range.

Seter had 23 points, Evan Norris added 14 and Colby Shaw grabbed 10 boards for the Wildcats. But perhaps the most notable stat line to the Wildcats was Stevenson’s Isaac Hoidal’s six points. Hoidal, the reigning Trico League MVP, leads Southwest Washington in scoring with 21.3 points per game. He was fronted much of the night by Bryant and fouled out in the second half.

Instead, Stevenson was paced by Jesse Miller who hit 4 of 8 3-pointer to finish with 21 points. Lincoln Krog added 14 points.

The crowd, which packed the small but thunderous gym, saved its loudest cheers for the fourth quarter, when the Wildcats held a comfortable lead.

Seter entered the night needing 19 points to reach 1,000 career points. Teammates posted on their Snapchat stories telling fans to come out and support Seter.

His moment came with 5:41 left in the game when he caught a no-look pass from Evan Norris and finished a layup while being fouled, sending the crowd into a frenzy.

“It was great,” Seter said. “The crowd was getting into it.”

Seter, a senior, is the second player on the roster to reach that landmark in the span of a week after Hunter Ecklund (a junior) did so Jan. 3. Seter said he was vaguely aware 1,000 points was in sight coming into the season, but that with so many scorers on the roster, he was more worried about winning games.

Jeremy Ecklund said in his 12 years with the program he’s seen three 1,000-point scorers and two of them have come in the last week.

That gives the Wildcats even more confidence. Last season, the team won league but fell short of the 1A state tournament. The players are determined to avenge that loss this season.

Ask them, and they’re going to sprint all the way there.

Perhaps Thursday night was a show of what’s to come.

“We want to get back to state and bring home some hardware,” Seter said.

LA CENTER 103, STEVENSON 71

STEVENSON — Brady Hall 0, Jesse Miller 21, Jono Blackledge 5, Lincoln Krog 4, Preston Lowery 0, Charles Hobbs 4, Alec Van Pelt 3, Conner Blair 10, Isaac Hoidal 6, Willy Lanz 2, Ethan Haight 2, Nolan Boucher 0, Cooper Morrison 2, Bennett Wright 2. 26 (5) 14-21 71.

LA CENTER — Hunter Ball 8, Colby Shaw 9, Parker Ball 3, Ben Kelley 1, Tobey Deemer 0, Evan Norris 14, Avery Seter 23, Matt Bryant 29, Hunter Ecklund 16, Jeremy Humphrey 0, Riley Fender 0. 38 (14) 16-22 103.

Stevenson 22 16 18 15— 71
La Center 32 24 23 24—103