I don't know a lot about those teams up north except Bellevue Christian. They do have the big guy back, but from what I saw this summer, they don't have anyone to complement him or get him the ball. Unless they had several kids move in this fall, they will be down. As far as down south, it will be quite interesting. Kalama has 4 starters back and the first couple kids off the bench from last yr. This is a group of kids who've played together for 6 yrs and will be tough. LaCenter has 4 starters back, two 6'6 kids and all their best guards back plus a new coach. Then at Toledo, Scott Merzoiane has reloaded. The younger Rakoz played a ton of ball with a team out of Portland this summer and grew another 11/2 inches, pushing 6'8 with guard skills but strong around the basket. And Trafelet is back, 6'4/5 and has gotten a lot stronger, played a bunch this summer with a team out of Vancouver, a very good outside/in player. Saw both these kids this summer and both playing above the rim now. Both these kids were averaging over 20 per game and really complement one another. The rest of the team, they're 8 deep, is very balanced, a bunch of basketball junkies that can all shoot it. They had a great summer playing teams from a variety of classifications. And they have Scott Merzoiane as a coach and he's a good one. They will face some challenges early as Rakoz rolled up an ankle last week and is doubtful till about the 10th of Dec and his cousin Lakota Rakoz rolled his up last weekend and will probably miss a couple of games. There's also a couple of very decent teams to fill out District 4 south so it will be a very competitive league. Up north in District 4 you have Hoquim. They've been hanging their hats on this group of seniors for a long time. They're the 2nd biggest 1A school in the state and have a good group of athletes coming back. Several kids that are 6'5 and athletic, a couple of really good guards to round them out, and a decent bench. They could very easily be playing in the district 4 championship game. For what it's worth, Toledo beat Kalama, Zilla, and Meridian this summer and I heard they all had their full complement of players. As I said for what its worth. But I know that for any team to make it to the state tourney, it's going to be a dogfight on the west side of the mountains to see who gets there.
