Whatcom County prep basketball teams have set a new standard. Anything less than three state championships per season is a down year.
That might sound like recency bias, because it is. Both Lynden teams and the Nooksack Valley girls captured state championships at the Yakima Valley SunDome on Saturday, March 2.
Lynden Christian got third-place finishes from both its teams, and the Lummi Nation boys took sixth at the 1B state tournament in the Spokane Arena.
With a trio of titles each of the past three seasons, even two next year would feel like a letdown. (I have become accustomed to Championship Saturday chaos; it’s all I have ever known.)
But you needn’t fret: I will tell you why next year could be equally as prosperous, despite a healthy batch of seniors preparing to trade in their high school uniforms for college kits.
Before we get there, we must understand how this season’s championship teams left a historical stamp on their local communities, the SunDome and the state.
Three can be greater than three
Sure, Whatcom County could have swept the Class 1A/2A state championships this season and won four instead of three. From a bird’s eye view of the past three years, this would have been the time.
The Lynden (2A) and Lynden Christian (1A) boys were each already back-to-back champions and seeded No. 2 in their tournaments. The Nooksack Valley girls (1A) and LC girls had faced off in the previous two title games, and both were top-three seeds.
Lynden’s girls team lost one game all season (to NV, conveniently), was the No. 2 seed and looked like a well-oiled machine under Rob Adams — the coach who brought the program all three of its previous titles.
But even without that feat, this year’s title victories all had historical significance beyond having their names etched into a trophy below a gold ball.
After the Lynden and LC boys won back-to-back titles last year, a pair of three-peats was on everyone’s minds. And even then, with all the talent LC had this year, only one came through. If things had gone slightly differently in the closing seconds of Lynden’s one-point semifinal win over No. 11 Bremerton, that one wouldn’t have come to pass, either.
Winning three straight championships at the high school level, with a constant cycling of players, is exceedingly rare, at least in Washington’s upper four classifications (1A–4A).
The Lynden boys became the first team in Class 2A history, boys or girls, to win three in a row, and they are just the sixth overall — joining last year’s Garfield girls team (3A) as the only programs to pull it off in the last 16 years. (Locally, the LC girls won three 1A titles in a row from 1990–92.)
Lynden returned three players who saw the court on last year’s championship team: seniors Anthony Canales and Brady Elsner, and junior Brant Heppner. Even Elsner, who now owns the program’s single-season assist record with a stellar final season, was deep on the team’s bench a year ago.
The Lions completely rebuilt their rotation — it’s a credit to seven-time champion head coach Brian Roper and the incredible work ethic of the players who were thrust into significant roles.
Nooksack Valley’s girls team continued its “golden era” with its second straight championship. Last year was the first title in program history, and the Pioneers completed their redemption arc by knocking off LC in a rematch of the 2022 championship.
But this season’s team still had something to prove. The Pioneers, led by University of Washington hoops signee Devin Coppinger, wanted to show the state they weren’t a one-and-done group.
My favorite anecdote from the weekend was Coppinger discussing the locker room situation from all three of Nooksack’s trips to the SunDome. They had the same locker room the first two seasons, making them that much hungrier to win it last year after shedding tears of heartbreak in that same room.
This season, it was “a different beginning, different story, different team,” Coppinger said.
Their underdog story had ended; they had become the team to fear in Class 1A, and rightfully so.
Then there’s the Lynden girls’ championship, which had historical implications throughout. Remember how the Lynden boys became the first team in Class 2A history to win three in a row?
Ellensburg’s girls team was trying to become the second, less than two hours later. They nearly did, if not for a Haylee Koetje mid-range jumper, a turnover by the Bulldogs on their next possession and a narrow miss on a game-tying 3-pointer at the game’s buzzer.
After winning 75 straight games dating back to June 5, 2021, the Bulldogs’ insane streak had come to an end. (Unfortunately, those claiming Lynden’s 2020 quarterfinals win over Ellensburg was its last loss are wrong; the Bulldogs lost again in consolation that year and twice in the 2020–21 season.)
It was also Adams’ first season back after three away, and he picked up right where he left off. He has technically won two in a row, as he stepped away following the Lions’ championship in 2020.
The future is bright
While the sun is setting on the current player corps in the Lynden boys, LC boys and Nooksack Valley girls programs, not all of our perennial contenders will be decimated by graduation.
The Lynden girls have some seriously talented underclassmen, led by sophomore Payton Mills and freshman Finley Parcher.
Mills was named the girls 2A state tournament MVP after racking up 33 points and 23 rebounds in the Lions’ first two games. She got into foul trouble in the championship, limiting her overall impact on that game.
Parcher, in her first high school season, averaged 12.6 points, 7.0 rebounds and 1.7 steals in Lynden’s three tournament games and was the Lions’ only double-digit scorer in the championship. She also shot 53% from the field.
Those two are bonafide stars, but keep an eye on freshman Lexi Hermanutz, junior Kiki York, sophomore Rian Stephan and sophomore Degitu Bowler — all of whom will return after being in Lynden’s rotation this past season.
LC’s girls team, which fell one point short of its sixth straight championship appearance, is also going to be just fine. The Lyncs’ backcourt duo of junior Grace Hintz and sophomore Ella Fritts will be back, and the Lyncs got a lot of quality minutes from junior Allison Shumate, among others.
In any other program, finishing third in the state with just one senior is overachieving. LC had the burden of an extremely high standard set the past five seasons.
The Lummi Nation boys, while finishing well below their No. 1 seed at sixth in Class 1B, will be back. Impact players such as sophomore Jerome Toby, freshman Dyson Edwards and juniors Tony Abrams and Karson Revey will all return.
The Blackhawks might not have the depth they had this year, but they could reload and be right back in a similar situation ahead of next season’s tournament.
For the record: The Lynden boys, LC boys and Nooksack Valley girls are not doomed to irrelevancy. Far from it, in fact. They will just be losing a lot of veteran leadership and talent that was integral to their current tournament runs.
There are always players, especially in the Lynden and LC boys programs, who are simply waiting their turn and would already be starters on other teams. (Watch out for the Lyncs’ Gannon Dykstra next season, who is primed to take that team over.)
They all have coaches that are among the best in the state and will put players where they fit best. Winning is contagious, and all three of those teams have two- or three-time state champions returning to their rosters.
Connor J. Benintendi is CDN’s sports editor; reach him at connorbenintendi@cascadiadaily.com; 360-922-3090 ext. 104.
