SNOHOMISH — On one hand, Snohomish boys basketball coach Len Bone was happy with his team’s 53-39 Wesco 4A victory over Kamiak on Friday night at Snohomish High School.
On the other hand, Bone knows his Panthers still have plenty of work to do as the regular season enters its final stretch.
“I thought we played pretty well a lot of the time,” he said. “But you know coaches are never satisfied. … Our team is getting tired of me talking about, ‘We’ve got to get better.’ But there’s things we can do better and we need to pay attention to them.”
Asked specifically what improvements he wants to see, Bone said, “I’d rather not say. But there’s a lot of things I think about.”
For one night, at least, the Panthers outplayed a Kamiak team that had beaten them earlier in the month. In the rematch, Snohomish sparred with the visitors through the early minutes before breaking on top to stay early in the second quarter.
The margin reached a high of 17 points late in the third quarter before the Knights managed a brief rally, pulling within 43-36 midway through the final period. But Snohomish took control again, outscoring Kamiak 10-3 over the final 51/2 minutes.
Leading the Panthers was the senior guard-center tandem of Zak Carlson and Collin Kane. The 6-foot-3 Carlson led all scorers with 22 points, including 11 in the second quarter as Snohomish pulled in front. He added eight more in the third period, including the layin that gave the Panthers their game-high lead of 41-24.
“Zak had a great game,” Bone said. “He made a lot of nice finishes, and hit a couple of perimeter shots after missing a few (attempts) early. We need him to do that, but we also need him to organize us and lead us. And we need him to not just lead us and not just look to score, but to be able to do both.”
Kane, a 6-9 post, dropped in six of Snohomish’s first eight points and added another five in the second period as the Panthers eased out to a 27-22 halftime lead.
“It’s nice that our two big guns had good games,” Bone acknowledged.
Also nice was a Snohomish defense that often made it difficult for the Knights to find good shots. Kamiak was held to three field goals in the second quarter and just one in the third quarter. And after the Knights rallied within seven points in the fourth period, Snohomish tightened its defense and kept them without a field goal the rest of the way.
“We were pretty alert defensively,” Bone said. “We didn’t defend real there at the beginning of the fourth quarter when (the lead) went from 17 down to seven. We gave up (10) points in about three minutes, but other than that our defense was pretty good all night.”
The Panthers expect to be a playoff team, but their postseason fortunes will likely depend on their progress in the coming weeks, Bone said.
“We’ve got more practices and games to work on things,” he said. “We’re trying to make progress … (but) if this is as good as we get, then our season is going to end earlier than we want it to.”
Kamiak was led in scoring by the nine points of guard Jase Wiley.
At Snohomish H.S.
Kamiak 13 9 4 13 —39
Snohomish 11 16 14 12 —53
Kamiak—Christian Clausen 0, Carson Tuttle 9, Chance Lord 2, Jase Wiley 9, Marcel McQueen Jr. 4, Coleman Grayson 6, Gavin Patrick 3, Andrew Foote 6, Keller Whitney 0, Nate Shubert 0. Snohomish—Tristan MacGregor 0, Zak Carlson 22, Jake Shogren 0, Will Layton 0, Mitch Morris 5, Kobe McDaniel 2, Gus Baxter 0, Kole Bride 3, Andrew Kane 0, Peyton Plucker 0, Danny McGregor 0, Jake Perry 2, Collin Kane 19, Seth Cavin 0. 3-point goals—Tuttle 1, Wiley 1, Patrick 1, Carlson 1, Morris 1. Records—Kamiak 6-5 league, 10-7 overall. Snohomish 9-2, 11-6.
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