[ t o u r n e y t o w n . c o m -- Nooksack Valley 68, Chewelah 36]

Nooksack Valley -- Heutink 5-7 3-5 13, Ty Willemsen 3-8 0-0 7, Boon 2-3 2-2 6, Vermeulen 10-10 1-1 21, Tr. Willemsen 0-0 0-0 0, Venn 0-0 0-0 0, VanDyken 0-1 2-3 2, Silves 7-10 1-4 15, Weirauch 1-4 0-1 2, Mitchell 0-0 0-0 0, Vinkes 0-0 0-0 0, Wells 1-6 0-0 2. Totals 29-49 9-16 68.

Chewelah -- Feist 2-5 3-4 8, Herda 0-1 0-0 0, Harting 0-1 0-0 0, Peaker 0-3 0-0 0, Belzer 2-9 6-8 10, Wood 0-1 0-0 0, C. Hagen 1-6 0-0 2, Burkey 0-3 1-2 1, M. Hagen 1-5 0-0 3, Scates 1-1 0-0 2, Hoots 1-4 2-2 4, Curry 3-6 0-0 6. Totals 11-45 12-16 36.

Nooksack Valley

Chewelah

3-point goals--NV 1-7 (Ty Willemsen 1-5, Weirauch 0-1, Boon 0-1), C 2-10 (Feist 1-1, M. Hagen 1-3, Herda 0-1, Harting 0-1, Peaker 0-1, Hoots 0-1, Belzer 0-2). Rebounds--NV 29 (Silves 7, Wells 6), C 22 (Hoots 5, Belzer 5). Assists--NV 20 (Silves 8, Heutink 6), C 7 (Curry 4). Steals--NV 8 (Heutink 2, Silves 2), C 7 (Peaker 3, Belzer 3). Blocked shots--NV 3, C 4 (Hoots 2). Fouled out--None. Total fouls--NV 14, C 15. Technical fouls--None. Turnovers--NV 13, C 13.

By SCOTT SANDSBERRY
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC

OK, they weren’t perfect.

They missed some free throws. They committed a turnover here and there. One of them had his jersey untucked for almost a minute.

Other than that, the Nooksack Valley Pioneers were just about flawless.

Their 68-36 dissection of a very good Chewelah team in Friday night’s late semifinal was nothing short of a clinic, the kind of thing that should come with footnotes, handouts and a coffee break before the PowerPoint presentation.

The win puts the Pioneers in Saturday night's 9 o'clock championship game against Pullman. It's the first time in 29 years Nooksack Valley has returned to the championship game.

“We played pretty well, didn’t we?” said beaming coach Bill Kelly, who then burst into laughter at the understatement. “Sometimes when you work that hard
on defense, good things happen on offense. Between Jason (Heutink) and Phil (Silves), we had 14 assists, and (Kyle) Vermeulen was the recipient of a lot of that.”

And how. Asked immediately after the game if he’d missed any shots, he gave a little half-grin and decided, “I don’t remember.” That’s because his only misses came in the halftime shoot-around. During the game he was 10-for-10,
eight of them essentially layups after pinpoint assist passes — usually from Silves (eight assists) or Heutink (six assists), but also from center Tim Wells, guards Kyle Boon and Ty Willemsen and seemingly everybody in a purple uniform.

How could a state semifinal against a Chewelah team that was on a serious roll be so one-sided? A 10-10 deadlock four minutes into the game turned into a rout, 35-16 at halftime and 55-24 before both teams began filtering in reserves in what had left the competitive realm long before.

“I didn’t think it would end with that big of a margin,” said Silves, who had 15 points and seven rebounds. “They had the height on us, but we didn’t give up a single offensive rebound in the first half. And that is amazing, because we gave up so much height.”

That was all they gave up. Defensively, they gave the Cougars nothing.

Chewelah’s go-to guy, guard Andy Belzer, had scored 21 points in a quarterfinal victory over Lakeside the night before; with Vermeulen dogging him, Belzer managed just a single shot attempt in the first half. It missed.

Belzer finished with 10 points, but none of them came against Vermeulen and seven came during garbage time in the fourth quarter.

Just like Kelly always preaches: defense.

“I think it’s one of our best games,” Vermeulen said. “Everybody stepped up. Not just me and Phil and Jason. Everybody.”

That was evident nowhere more than in the assist column. The Pioneers had 20, and that led to 29-for-49 shooting (59.2 percent) from the field.

“How many assists did Fred Peete have today? None,” Kelly added, referring to the Pullman star who scored 37 points in the earlier semifinal. “Maybe one kid can beat you, I don’t know. We’ll find that out tomorrow.”

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