WINLOCK — The Napavine Tigers won their third straight C2BL title on Monday night, clinching it with a 67-46 win in Winlock.
Winlock was able to keep it close throughout the first half and into the third quarter, trailing by as few as five points midway through the third, but Napavine pulled away with a 14-3 run that pushed their lead to double-digits.
“I’m proud of the kids,” Napavine coach Eric Hersman said. “They’re good kids, they play hard, and they try to do the things that they ask you them to do. I think that’s a pretty good recipe for us, at least so far, and for life.”
Beckett Landram led the way with 24 points on Monday, and Cal Bullock added 16. Karsen Denault added 12 points, 12 rebounds, and four steals, and Hudson Chambers tallied 11 points, six rebounds, three steals, and two assists. Grady Wilson and Jack Nelson both scored two points, and Nelson came down with seven rebounds.
Napavine finishes its regular season 18-2 overall and 15-1 in league play. Over the past three seasons, the Tigers have gone 39-2 in C2BL play.
This is Hersman’s first league title as the team’s head coach, as he was an assistant on former coach Rex Stanley’s staff each of the past two seasons.
Hersman noted that it’s a cool accomplishment to win the “difficult” league, but he also added that the Tigers still have bigger goals they hope to achieve.
“I think that’s something that you look back on at the end of the year, it’s a positive checkmark,” Hersman said. “We’re just trying to get better as things go on. We’re fortunate we have more games. We’re gonna keep working on those games till we’re out of games to play, then we’ll look back and see how it was.”
The next goal on Napavine’s list will be defending their district title and earning a trip to state. As the top seed from the C2BL, the Tigers will have a first-round bye and won’t be back on the court until next Wednesday, Feb. 12 at Castle Rock.
It’s a lengthy layoff for a team that is used to playing multiple games a week, but Hersman is confident that they’ll be ready when the time comes.
“We’ll work on us for four days and then figure out who we’re gonna play,” Hersman said. “We’ll see how it goes.”
Winlock (7-13, 5-11 C2BL) will be back on the floor on Saturday in the first round of the district tournament. As the No. 6 seed, the Cardinals will take on No. 4 Rainier at either Rochester or Montesano.
Winlock coach Rich Cline was proud of the way his team battled against Napavine on Monday, even if the final score got a little out of hand late.
“This is probably the best game we’ve played all year,” Cline said. “That’s a state tournament team, and we hung with them for two and a half quarters … I couldn’t be more proud of these guys.”
Landen Cline led the Cardinals with 13 points, four assists, and two blocks, while Freddy Patching added 10 points. Jaxyn Pelagio added eight along with three steals, and Mason Ruiz grabbed a game-high 14 rebounds.
When Winlock takes the floor on Saturday, it will be the first time the Cardinals have played in a district tournament game since the 2019-20 season.
“That was our goal,” Rich Cline said. “We play our game, hopefully we can beat somebody. That’s gonna take a lot of effort and a lot of passion … Hopefully, come Saturday, we can give a good effort and see what happens.”
