The day after graduation, the Skagway Panthers hoops teams started the long slog to Sitka to participate in a regional tournament… sort of. None of the teams in this tourney played in the regional “State” tournament because of COVID protocols.
Both the Panther teams ended up in the finals, and both lost the championship games to their counterparts from Angoon.
The tournament saw its share of drama. Take the girls’ semi-final game: The Lady Panthers were tied with Hoonah with 7.9 seconds on the clock. Hoonah attempted to inbound the ball under the Skagway basket.
But Skagway stole the ball on the inbounds play. Lady Panther Coach Nate Jennings started yelling wildly for a timeout. Unfortunately, the officials didn’t see him until there were only 1.3 seconds left on the clock.
That’s enough time for a shot, but all signs pointed to overtime.
“Last year when we got bumped out of regionals by Hoonah, Iraida took the last shot when we were down by three. And she was just inside the three-point line, and it went in for two and we lost by one. So Iraida was devastated, all of us were devastated. With 1.3 left I knew they’d be focusing on Tatum (Seger). And they just forgot about Iraida,” said Jennings.
So the coach drew up a play to put senior guard Iraida Hisman in the same spot she got the ball last year. The pass came in clean, she was open, and this time, with both feet behind the three-point line, she nailed the game-winning shot. The buzzer sounded while the ball was still in the air. The ball circled the rim and fell in, and the Skagway faithful went crazy.
The Panther boys took a different route to the finals. After winning their first three games, Skagway faced the Angoon boys in the championship game. Coach Ross Barrett said it was a hard-fought game, both teams played well, but Angoon just kept hitting the clutch shots.
“They shot lights out, they played hard too. And just it was a close game. It came down to the wire, it came down to a last-second shot. And unfortunately, the ball just didn’t bounce our way,” said Barrett.
Senior guard Silas Myers, who’d scored 23 points in the first quarter of the semi-final game, got the ball and got a decent look to tie the game. But with an opponent’s hand in his face, his shot fell short, and Skagway took second place.
“I want to give props to all these guys. They’ve made huge leaps this year. Every single one of them, you know, they’ve improved immensely. They really came together as a team this year. And I’m really proud of them for everything they did,” said Barrett.
In the wide world of outdoor sports, Garrett “The GM,” Montgomery says the Haines’ local disc golf club, in coordination with a few businesses in town, set out last month to secure official disc golf baskets for the course at the Southeast Alaska Fairgrounds, called The Raven’s Bowl. The plan is to place the baskets within about 30 feet of the existing keg targets and expand the course to 40 holes.
“It’d be really good to have an official course with baskets. And yeah, it could drive more people from Juneau, when Whitehorse reopens people can come down and play. We can actually have a sanctioned PDGA tournament,” said Montgomery.
PDGA stands for the Professional Disc Golf Association, the national governing body for disc golf. For now, the only tourney the club has lined up is on August 1, on the Sunday of the Southeast Alaska State Fair weekend. Of course, they’re hoping to schedule more.
