By Terry Mosher

Sun Sports Writer

Mike Jesch carried South Kitsap through its first two high school basketball games. The big 6-7 center, fresh from a summer trip to the Soviet Union where he played 10 games with and against some of the best amateur players in the world, dominated the action in SK wins over Bremerton and Olympic, scoring 25 and 19 points.

But Bremerton learned fast. The small Knights, who don’t start a player taller than 5-foot-10, incedibily took away Jesch, hold him to just five points last night in Port Orchard.

The Knights, though, couldn’t hold down Paul Lassila. The 6-3 senior threw in 15 second-half points, including the biggest basket of the night, as the Wolves entertained a large crowd with a 57-55 double-overtime victory over the Knights in a game rated a 10 as far as spectator pleasing.

Lassila, who scored a team-high 19 and grabbed 10 rebounds, took Sk’s only shot in the first overtime. But it was verrrrry big.

Bremerton had scored the first five points of the first overtime to take a 54-49 lead with 1:29 left. The Wolves clawed back with free throws by Jeremy Field (2) and by Lassila (2) and were down by two, 55-53, ten ticks from defeat when Lassila came through.

Taking the ball about 20 feet from the basket, Lassila dribbled to the baseline, turned, jumped and fired with two second showing.

Swish.

“I got the ball, looked up and didn’t have a whole lot of time to react,” Lassila said. “You can’t think out there because things happen so fact. I got it and the first instinct was to shoot it. I shot it and it came out right.”

“They say,” Lassila added, “that when it comes down to the final closing seconds of the game you want to be the person to step up and take that shot, and that’s exactly what happened. My reactions just took charge. You don’t have time to think about it.”

Larry Gallagher, who this year traded in years of South Kitsap loyalty as a longtime Cedar Heights Junior High coach and then as an assistant to SK headman Darrell Anderson for the head job at Bremerton, gave due credit to Lassila.

“That was a pressure shot,” he said. “This is the South Kitsap’s kids second year together. They are seniors. Last year they went through some tough times and lost the close ones. This year they are winning the close ones.”

Then Gallagher, who seems to have the Bremerton program up and on issued a warning.

“We are going to win the tough ones too,” he said. “We got some thing we’re still working on. I brought a whole new program to these kids from what they are used to. We don’t play a lot of just straight zone as the Knights did under retired coach Les Eathorne. We do a lot of trapping, lot of pressure. These kids are adjusting to it well.”

The Knights deserved a better fate that’s for sure. They played hard and well against a taller, more experienced SK team, only to lose it when Brian Spang hit two free throws one minute into the second overtime. Spang’s two charity tosses were the only points scored in the second extra period and pushed the Wolves to 3-0 and the Knights to 0-3.

Bremerton’s last chance at victory ended with two seconds left when Casey Lindberg, who scored a game-high 21 points, missed a three-pointer under extreme pressure. The ball was short and Rob Endsley cradled the ball in his arms after snaring his game-high 14^th rebound.

It was Lindberg who sent the game into he first overtime. The Knights had gotten the ball on a steal with 1:37 left and Gallagher called time. During the time out, Anderson switched out of his zone to a man defense, which surprised and confused the Knights.

Finally, with Lindberg matched up with the only SK player his own size, 5-8 Joe Callaghan, Gallagher yelled to his players to clear out one side and let Lindberg go one-on-one with Callaghan. They did and Lindberg, whose quickness is only matched by Todd Lewis, his running mate at guard, mad his move, taking Callaghan into the lane. Lindberg rose and shot over the outstretched hands of Jesch, who had come from underneath the basket to challenge Lindberg. But it was too late. Lindberg’s shot rattled in to tie it at 49 with 28 seconds to go.

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South Kitsap's Paul Lassila is fouled from behind as he tries to shoot over the out-stretched hand of Bremerton's DeForest Phelps.

SK called time to set up a last-second shot, but Fields’ 12-foot jumper from the side hit the rim and bounced back to Lewis, who hit the backboard on a three-quarter length shot at the buzzer.

Anderson was happy to get the win over a team he thinks is being underrated. But he still saw things that need to be corrected, including the fact that Jesch didn’t get the ball much (he shot just seven times, hitting two).

“We didn’t work the ball inside, geez, for at least a quarter and half,” said Anderson. “He didn’t even get a sniff at the ball. Here you got a kid 6-7 and a kid 6-5 (Endsley) and they are not touching the ball as much as they should. We have a lot of work to do.”

A lot of credit goes to the Knights, however.  They used their quickness to shut off the passing avenues to Jesch, although it did leave open Lassila, who canned six of 10 from the field.

“We did a much better job on the boards and did a much better job of taking away the inside game,” said Gallagher. “We talked about it and worked on some things Wednesday and Thursday.”

“We know,” Gallagher said, “that we have to be able to stop big men in our league. Fronting the post is a must and tonight we did that, got good backside help and pressure on the ball. Those are the elements you need. It’s tough to get the ball into the post when you are fronting them, get backside help and you get pressure on the ball. The kids understand that, and they have to work together as a team.”

Lassila, who believes he and his teammates can make it to triple-A state, praised Bremerton.  “They are tougher (than the first time they played).” he said. “They seem to have better ball movement. They certainly made up work harder on the perimeter game. They had four guys on the perimeter and it makes it hard to defend.”

The Wolves got bench help from Robert Moore and Heath Nix. Moore added eight points on perfect shooting from the field and free throw line and Nix pulled three key rebounds even though he played only three minutes.

Moore’s presence also seemed to give the Wolves emotionally lifts at crucial times.

Asked what it would have meant to come back to Port Orchard, where he’s taught and coached for so long, and gotten the win, Gallagher said, “You always want to get a victory. I’m kind of at a lost (for words) right now. The kids gave everything. Both teams did. That was great high school basketball game.

“Win or lose,” Gallagher continued, “this is the type of game kids are going to remember. That is what athletics are all about. I though the sportsmanship displayed by both teams was outstanding. That’s what it’s all about.

“I would have like to have won,” Gallagher said, “but in a lot of ways I did.”

Anderson said, “Hey, I’m not going to back off what I said last week. Bremerton is going to surprise the heck out of people in that Olympic League. If you are not prepared to play Bremerton, they are going to beat you. It’s that simple.”

AREA SUMMARIES

Boys Non-League

Bremerton’s seen enough of Michelle Snell.

Snell, 5-11 senior for South Kitsap, sank seven of nine free throws down the stretch last night and hit a team-high 13 points as the homestanding Wolves nipped Bremerton for the second time in a week, winning this time 31-29.

In the game a week ago, Snell hit two free throws with one second remaining to give the Wolves a 36-35 victory. Snell scored 14 points in that win.

“She just lit it up at the end and basically that won the game for us,” said first-year coach Dan Whitford, who now has the Wolves 4-0 on the season.

“Snell got us again,” sighed Bremerton coach Doug Wagner. “She’s an awesome shooter. You can’t put her on the line. They got the ball in her hand when they needed to, we had to foul, and that beat us.”

In other non-league West Sound girls’ action last night, Quilcene held off visiting Sultan 39-37, Bainbridge downed North Mason 62-37 at Winslow, Sequim was a 56-28 winner at Port Townsend, Olympic bowed 47-18 to Bellarmine in Tacoma and Chimacum defeated North Kitsap’s junior varsity 51-28 on the Cowboys’ floor.

South Kitsap 31, Bremerton 29 – Bremerton, which trailed 19-13 at halftime, got back in the contest by holding the Wolves to just two points in the third quarter. But down the stretch the Wolves matched every move the Knights’ made.

One late move that caught the Wolves by surprise was the insertion in the game by Wagner of 5-9 senior forward Laura VanHollebek. VanHollebeck drilled two shots in a row to put the Knights within two points.

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“Laura is just a pure shooter,” said Wagner. “Under pressure she did a heck of a job.”

The big key, other than Snell’s clutch shooting, was, and has been, the Wolves defense. No opponent has scored into the 40s yet.

Whitford changes defense constantly to confuse his opponents. “That keeps people off balance,” he said. “Fundamentally we are doing things that we want to do defensively, denying the ball, not allowing them to cut to the ball, denying the baseline and things like that.”

Mikki Haugen led the 2-2 Knights with eight points. Missy Beard added six points and a team-high 11 rebounds. Lixx Hensen tossed in nine points and Snell pulled down a game-high 16 rebounds for the Wolves, who play at Gig Harbor on Wednesday. Bremerton is at Olympic on Tuesday to start Olympic League play.

Girls Non-League