THERE WAS SOME chatter that the Neah Bay Red Devils were well aware of in the postseason.
“We heard rumors that we were the least talented Red Devils team,” junior guard Kenrick Doherty Jr. said.
“We went into that game wanting to prove them wrong.
“That kind of pissed us off.”
Even the doubters can’t doubt this undeniable fact: the 2015-16 Neah Bay Red Devils are the first team in school history to win a state championship in basketball.
“First ever,” Doherty said.
The Red Devils earned that bragging right by annihilating top-ranked Almira/Coulee-Hartline 73-48 in the Class 1B state championship game Saturday at Spokane Arena.
Maybe Neah Bay doesn’t have as much individual talent as in the past.
But no Red Devils team has exceeded the sum of its parts to the extent that this year’s team did.
And it certainly took a team effort for Neah Bay to win the first state basketball title in school history.
Doherty started it all by scoring the Red Devils’ first 10 points of the game.
By the his one-man barrage was done, Neah Bay held a 10-3 lead.
Doherty only scored four more points in the game, but those first 10 were enough to set the tone and put Almira/Coulee-Hartline on its heels.
Anthony Bitegeko came off the bench and scored four of the Red Devils’ 10 second-quarter points to help maintain the lead when the Warriors got back into it.
Almira/Coulee-Hartline got within one point, 25-24, but Neah Bay scored the last four points of the half.
Rwehabura Munyagi Jr. drove the lane for a bucket, and then Cameron Buzzell, who probably was in the game because of foul trouble, calmly hit both ends of a one-and-one with 2.4 seconds left to push the lead to 29-24.
Munyagi and Ryan Moss were held to four points apiece in the first half, but both got going in the third quarter and led the Red Devils on their decisive 17-0 scoring run that turned a 33-29 lead into 50-29 and essentially put the game away.
Munyagi started it with a drive for two points. McGimpsey did likewise to make it 37-29.
Then Moss, the Red Devils’ leading scorer, hit a jumper from near the left baseline.
He added two more points after rebounding a missed free throw.
Doherty added a bucket, and the lead was 43-29.
Then Moss hit a 3-pointer with the shot clocking running low.
Munyagi made a steal and a layup to make it 48-29.
Munyagi made another steal and another layup to make it 50-29 with 1:29 left in the third quarter.
When Payton Nielson scored the Warriors’ next points, the team’s first in five minutes, their chances to win their second state title and finish the season undefeated were grim.
Almira/Coulee-Hartline did score the last six points of the third to cut the deficit to 50-35, but four points by Reggie Buttram and two by Bitegeko helped Neah Bay open the fourth with a 6-2 run that snuffed out any momentum the Warriors might have developed.
Bitegeko and Buttram each scored six points in the final quarter as the Red Devils tore apart the Warriors’ full-court press.
Bitegeko finished with 10 points. Buttram scored eight points in his final high school game. And as he did all season, Buttram went toe-to-toe with Almira/Coulee-Hartline’s taller post players
Moss added four more points in the fourth and finished with a team-high 15 for the Red Devils.
“In the championship game, when you’re highest man is 15 points, that’s when you know it’s a team victory,” Doherty said.
Moss concludes his career with 1,302 points. He scored 198 of those in this year’s postseason, including 41 points in the state quarterfinal victory over Taholah.
Buzzell hit a free throw and punctuated the victory with a layup with six seconds remaining to finish with a season-high five points.
Buzzell also becomes the first Neah Bay Red Devil to win state championships in all three sport seasons. He has been part of two fall titles (football), one in the winter (basketball), and last spring he ran a leg of the track and field team’s state champion 4×100-meter relay.
McGimpsey was hampered by foul trouble for much of the game, but still contributed in each quarter and finished with nine points and four rebounds.
Munyagi, only a sophomore, finished Saturday’s game with 12 points, seven steals, six assists and five rebounds.
Those seven steals might have been the key component to Neah Bay’s win, as Munyagi never let the Warriors get comfortable.
Or maybe the key was Doherty’s hot start.
Or Moss’ timely shooting.
See what I mean? Team effort.
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Sports Editor Lee Horton can be reached at 360-417-3525 or at lhorton@peninsuladailynews.com.
