‘Boys’ win league championship, head to tourney as No. 1 seed

Published 7:54 pm Thursday, October 2, 2008

The Mount Si Wildcat boys’ hoops team continued to struggle offensively last Tuesday night at Bellevue, but there’s one thing they can say for sure: they are the Kingco regular season champions.

Despite 17 points from Kyle Meuli and 15 from Kevin Englund, the Wildcats had trouble scoring points in the first half and fell to the Wolverines 52-48. Mount Si made a third-quarter charge to take the lead at the end of the frame, but Bellevue responded with a rally of their own late to seal the deal on their “Senior Night.”

Junior Luke Sikma had a double-double (17 points and 11 rebounds) to lead the Wolverines. Brian Monk, one of four Bellevue seniors playing their final home game as Wolverines, scored 11 and junior John McGough added 10 to pace the winners.

All was not lost for Mount Si, however, as Sammamish walloped Newport by 20 points, clinching the Kingco regular season title for the Wildcats, the first such league title for Mount Si since 1979 when the school was a member of the Seamount League. Mount Si last won a Kingco Conference regular season crown in 1961.

The Wildcats were looking for some confidence in their offense last Thursday at Newport and they got it. Four players scored in double figures and Mount Si hit 61 percent of their shots from inside the three-point line as the Wildcats won 83-69 over the Knights.

The 83 points was the highest point total for Mount Si this season, and the Wildcats’ efforts were led by the 18 points of Englund and 16 of Meuli. Great supporting efforts were put in by Tommy Abbott and Ryan Reilly; Abbott scored 14 and Reilly 13. Kyle Clearman pitched in seven assists to help the cause.

Mount Si’s efforts were helped by strong defense; they forced 23 Newport turnovers.

Reilly was pleased with his team’s accomplishment.

“We’ll take it. It’s not the way we wanted it to go [last Tuesday] night but if that’s what it takes to get first,” said Reilly at practice last Wednesday.

Getting this title means a bye in the league tournament and with their first game scheduled for this Thursday, the team will have had a good week to prepare. There is a lot of work that needs to be done, especially on offense. At Mount Si’s practice last Wednesday, Englund said he thinks he has a solution to their problems: ball movement and team play.

“We’ve got to keep moving the ball,” Englund said. “I mean, over these past couple of games, a couple of times we’ve gotten into situations where everyone’s trying to get it done themselves,” Englund said. “We’ve got to make sure and work the ball around and that’s really the best way to get our best shots and highest percentage shots.”

Reilly isn’t sure what to make of the significance of this title.

“Right now, I can’t really imagine what that would be like,” he said. “We know it’s a big deal, but I’ll probably look back five years from now or 10 years from now and be like, ‘Wow.’ “

Mount Si can’t rest on its laurels now, as the road is only going to get tougher. Their first Kingco Tournament game at Bellevue Community College is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. this Thursday, with a game on Friday at BCC as well, either at 3 p.m. or 6:30 p.m. The late game Friday will be for the Kingco tournament championship and a top seed into the SeaKing District Tournament, where some very tough teams await from the Metro League, such as Bainbridge, Seattle Prep, O’Dea and Rainier Beach, who all look to make serious runs for state berths from the district. Mount Si will have to be at the top of its game, similar to their performance last Thursday, in order to beat these quality opponents, all of whom have prize Division I college material playing for them.