POLAND — The Poland boys basketball team is accustomed to rallying from double-digit deficits, but its shots started falling too late in Tuesday’s 61-52 loss to Lake Region in a Class B South preliminary-round game.
“We played with fire a little too much with that this year, but we know we can battle back, and I think they showed that we just needed a few more minutes on the clock,” Poland coach Jason Knight said.
The eight-seeded Knights (13-6) trailed the ninth-seeded Lakers (10-9) by 17 points, 51-34, with two minutes left. Poland scored 18 more points, and a pair of 3-pointers by Anthony Warren cut the deficit to nine with about a minute left, and but that was as close at the Knights got.
How did Lake Region win?
• The Lakers’ inside-out game was especially effective in the first half, with Cooper Smith working in the paint and Brock Gibbons hitting shots from beyond the 3-point arc.
“I mean, they were running a zone, so we’d get the ball inside, and then he’d kick it out, and it was just open shots,” Gibbons said. “We took what we had.”
• Lake Region’s Jacoby True handled the pressure of hitting clutch free throws, sinking eight in the final two minutes of the game.
• The Knights were without a couple of players. Thomas Hamilton was injured and Damon Martin, one of their top players, received two technical fouls in the regular-season finale and had to sit. Knight said that not having Martin altered Poland’s game plan.
They said it
• “Jake Jamo has been a real key for us the last several weeks. He’s really progressing as a freshman. Obviously, he can play inside and out. I thought they did a good job kind of defending him on the inside, and then late, he obviously stepped out and hit a few 3s, and so he’s got a nice game that way. Yeah, Anthony Warren, as a senior, stepped up. He had a great game to close his career. So there was a lot of good stuff.” — Jason Knight
• “It was great. My teammates were dishing me some great passes. It was just working for me all night long.” — Cooper Smith
• “That’s what our goal was, to get into the Expo and see if we can’t make a run.” — Brock Gibbon
Statistical leaders
• Lake Region: Smith (16 points), Gibbons (12 points), True (10 points).
• Poland: Warren (16 points), Jake Jamo (16 points).
Up next
• Lake Region will face top-seeded Medomak Valley (18-0) in the quarterfinals at the Portland Expo at 8:30 p.m., Friday. The teams met Dec. 21, when the Panthers beat the Lakers 65-40 in Naples.
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