Lewiston wins 29th annual Golden Throne

Jan. 27—At the conclusion of the 29th Golden Throne games between the Clarkston and Lewiston girls and boys basketball teams on Friday at the P1FCU Activity Center, students from both schools presented a check of $24,000 to the Samayoa Family, the Willow Center and the HUB.

The presentation of the money raised by both student bodies every year in the leadup to the Golden Throne event is a testimony to the community support in the Lewiston-Clarkston Valley.

Support that was brought together through the spirit of competition.

Before the donation total was announced, the Bantam girls downed the Bengals 66-37 to start the event and the Lewiston boys prevailed 57-47 in Game 2 of the doubleheader.

The total points of the games gave the slight edge to Clarkston, but the decider was the third criteria of the Golden Throne event — spirit, which is graded by a panel of judges.

The Bengals were announced as the winners of the midas-touched toilet, their third in five years.

It was the second Golden Throne victory during Bengals boys coach Brooks Malm's tenure and the first of Julie Fisher's as the head of the girls team.

Here's how the games played out on Friday:

Eye of the tiger

Malm promised to get a tattoo if Lewiston took home the Throne (with the caveat of backing out of the bet if the boys team lost in the nightcap).

"I don't even have a tattoo," Malm said. "I'm a pretty straight-laced guy. No tattoos, no earrings — I have a short haircut so I don't know. ... I'm probably going to get a tiger eye. Or a tiger face, I don't know."

The Bantams (8-8) and the Bengals (11-6) went toe-to-toe in a game that put the Golden Throne's future home (and the prospects of Malm's apropos tattoo) in doubt.

Lewiston had the advantage early, opting to go to the strength of its offense inside the paint.

Clarkston's defense collapsed on the interior players, leaving open looks from 3-point range for Lewiston early.

The Bengals used a full-court press early that left the Bantams uncomfortable, but the game was far from a sure thing and Clarkston cut what was an eight-point Lewiston lead after the first quarter down to a 29-27 disadvantage at halftime.

The Bantams hadn't been getting good looks from outside the arc and opted to go inside the paint in the second half. It worked to an extent, but Clarkston was unable to convert at a high clip from the free-throw line (9-for-18 for the day).

The Bengals "stayed the course," according to Malm with the Bantams closing in and slowly piled on its lead in the second half to come out with the 10-point win.

Clarkston had several chances to cut the lead further, or take the lead at a couple of early junctures, but the inefficient night from the charity stripe and the floor (13-for-30 shooting) sunk its prospects of victory.

"(Lewiston) just hit really timely shots," Clarkston coach Justin Jones said. "We tried to do some things defensively, tried to switch things up to try and somewhat keep them off balance because they're so dangerous — they have such good inside presence yet their outside shooting is excellent."

Senior Rylan Gomez and sophomore Royce Fisher paced Lewiston with 12 and 15 points, respectively, in the win.

Bantam girls stay perfect

Alahondra Perez kicked off the day's event in Game 1 of the basketball doubleheader with a 3-pointer on Clarkston's first possession. The triple made her the 200th player in the event's history to hit a 3-pointer.

But Lewiston (7-13) wasn't content with letting its foes from Washington's side of the bridge run away early.

The Bengals were able to get through the Bantams' trademark full-court press and, when Clarkston adjusted and tried to double-team and trap the point guard at the top of the key, Lewiston was able to get through that, too.

The Bantams (17-0) have won a lot of games this season by creating extra possessions with turnovers forced before or right after their opponents bring the ball past the half-court line.

Without that advantage, Lewiston was able to hang with Clarkston through the first half.

The Bengals led three separate times and there were just as many ties before the Bantams ended the first 16 minutes of regulation on a 9-0 run to go into halftime leading 28-19.

Clarkston's halfcourt defense might not have gotten its usual results, but its perimeter defense definitely did.

The Bantams shut down jump-shot opportunities for the Bengals and forced several steals and leaped into pass lanes outside the 3-point line. With an entire facet of the offense shut down, and starter Breanna Albright facing foul trouble through most of the second half, Clarkston was able to go on a run and held Lewiston to 18 points in the half.

The Bantams put up 38 in the same timeframe to win by 29.

"We had a big emphasis placed on perimeter defense," Clarkston coach Debbie Sobotta said. "We wanted to get up on them a little bit more than we had in the first half. ... We came out of halftime with no one in foul trouble so we felt like we could get a little more aggressive."

The near-30 point win was the second-largest margin of victory for the Clarkston girls at the event and tied for the fifth-largest win in terms of point differential among the girls games in Golden Throne history. Clarkston also sank 12 3-pointers, breaking the girls single-game record of the event.

"I thought we handled the (defensive) pressure really well, that was one of our goals," Fisher said. "And the first half we did a really good job in transition. The second half we got beat on transition because they are a lot deeper than we are. We get tired and they're just hammering down. ... But I was really proud of the girls for handling the fullcourt pressure and working their way through that halfcourt defense."

Moral victories

The PA system at the event had some technical difficulties. The last one was probably the most unfortunate. At the announcement of the Golden Throne, some in attendance had heard "Lewiston," others heard "Clarkston" — leading to large portions of both student sections looking excited and others looking confused.

Once the confusion cleared, Lewiston celebrated their victory in totality between players and the student section.

It wasn't all bad for the Clarkston faithful, however. In addition to seeing the girls team put up one of the more impressive victories in the event's history, their mascot won a (maybe) impromptu wrestling match with Benny the Bengal at halftime of the boys game.

Players of the night

Jaelyn McCormack-Marks had a double-double of 12 points and 10 rebounds to go with four assists, three steals and two blocks in the boys game.

Fisher had a team-high 15 points for the Lewiston boys on 5-of-9 shooting, four of them 3-pointers, and Xander Van Tine had a game-high 17 for the Clarkston boys.

GIRLS

LEWISTON (7-13)

Bay Delich 0 1-2 1, Breanna Albright 3 0-0 7, Skye VanTrease 1 0-0 2, Emery McKarcher 0 0-0 0, Addy McKarcher 4 1-4 9, Avery Lathen 1 1-2 4, Mara Kessinger 0 0-2 0, Reese DeGroot 4 1-2 9, Taylor Holman 1 0-0 3, Avery Balmer 1 0-0 2. Totals 15 4-12 37

CLARKSTON (17-0)

Jaelyn McCormack-Marks 4 1-2 12, Kendall Wallace 6 0-2 15, Olivia Gustafson 1 0-1 2, Preslee Dempsey 2 0-0 6, Ryann Combs 1 1-2 3, Aneysa Judy 1 0-0 3, Eloise Teasley 3 5-6 11, Ella Leavitt 0 1-2 1, Tatum Sevy 0 0-0 0, Alahondra Perez 3 0-0 8, Joey Miller 0 0-0 0, Lexi Villavicencio 1 2-4 5. Totals 22 10-19 66

Lewiston 12 7 11 7—37

Clarkston 16 12 20 18—66

3-point goals — Albright, Lathen, Holman, McCormack-Marks 3, Wallace 3, Dempsey 2, Perez 2, Judy, Villavicencio.

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LEWISTON (11-6)

Rylan Gomez 6 0-2 12, Jordan Bramlet 0 5-6 5, Drew Alldredge 0 0-0 0, Jordan Walker 3 1-2 8, Royce Fisher 5 1-2 15, Dray Torpey 0 0-0 0, Parker Bogar 3 0-0 8, Drew Hottinger 4 1-6 9, Blaze Hepburn 0 0-0 0. Totals 21 8-18 57.

CLARKSTON (8-8)

Isaiah Woods 0 0-0 0. Marcisio Noriega 2 0-0 5, Nate Somers 3 0-2 6, Xander Van Tine 4 7-10 17, Niko Ah Hi 0 0-0 0, Carter Steinwand 3 0-2 7, Josh Hoffman 0 1-2 1, Jason Rinard 0 1-2 1, Ian Moore 5 0-0 10. Totals 17 9-18 47.

Lewiston 18 11 10 18—57

Clarkston 10 17 8 12—47

3-point goals — Fisher 4, Bogar 2, Walker, Van Tine 2, Noriega, Steinwand.

Kowatsch can be contacted at 208-848-2268, tkowatsch@lmtribune.com or on Twitter @Teren_Kowatsch.