Weed routs Mount Shasta in boys basketball title game. Here's what happened
The Weed boys basketball team pounced on Mount Shasta (22-9) with a barrage of early 3-pointers en route to a 61-38 win on Saturday in the Northern Section Division V title game at Shasta College.
Eight different Cougars scored, led by 17 points from sophomore Jaxon King. Junior Maddox Mize had 14 points and Logan Bowles added eight.
Kellen Riccomini led the way for Mount Shasta with 14 points and Brooks Andrus added nine.
Weed (23-5) took the challenge of coach Robert West to start the title tilt strong, outscoring the Bears 20-8 in the first quarter.
“We’ve played them twice and came out lackadaisical both times,” West said. “In the first game we were down by four after the first and just didn’t have much intensity.
“The last six to seven games we’ve challenged them to bring the intensity instead of relying on their athleticism. We want them to bring the pressure from the beginning.”
King opened the game with a bucket in the paint before Mize splashed a 3-pointer from the corner two possessions later.
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After a Riccomini bucket, Mize again hit, this time from inside the 3-point line. Following buckets from Hayden Porteous and Nick Mangrum, Weed exploded for a 10-0 run.
Mize hit his second trey of the period before senior D.J. Horton hit down low. King then scored five straight of his own, completing an old-fashioned three-point play and hitting from the field as Weed opened a 17-6 lead with less than a minute in the period.
By halftime, Weed had doubled up the Bears 38-19 on the strength of two Aden Rivera 3-pointers in the second period and four points from Bowles.
“D.J. is huge for us, he’s such a good game manager,” West said. “And with Jax (King) and (junior) Marcus (Horton), we have a three-headed monster. But we’ve got a lot of guys who can score.”
Mount Shasta tried to chip away at the Weed advantage in the third and fourth quarters, but couldn’t get it closer than 16.
“You saw it tonight that our defense intensity led to offense,” West said.
This is the third Northern Section title for Weed in the last four postseasons, but the first Division V title for the traditionally Division VI school.
They fell 72-65 last season to Trinity in the Division V finals. Losing only one key senior, West said the Cougars purposely scheduled up this season in hopes of making a deep state postseason run.
“After D.J.’s sophomore year, we lost in D6 state finals and knew we wanted to make a run,” West said. “We knew this year we had the talent. I’ve had eight of these kids since they were 9 years old and it’s been leading up to this.
This article originally appeared on Redding Record Searchlight: Weed routs Mount Shasta in boys basketball title game
