It's a busy weekend ahead for high school sports

t Girls’ gymnastics

team headed to districts.

Kitsap News Reports

KINGSTON — The Vikaneers’ season isn’t over quite yet. The first-year gymnastics team that draws from both North Kitsap High and Kingston High (NKK) is one of six gymnastics teams competing in today’s district meet in Auburn. By narrowly beating Olympia, the only other Narrows League team, the Vikaneers took the sixth place slot at the subdistricts meet on Feb. 2 and first place in the league.

“It’s OK there’s only two of us, but it is still fun,” NKK head coach Kris Goodfellow stated in an e-mail.

The first event at subdistricts was NKK’s strongest — the floor event. While three of the Vikaneers scored a 9 or higher on the event, only Mckenna Elves’ 9.45 earned a ranking. She placed eighth.

Overall, NKK earned a 157.75, the team’s highest score of the season.

Melissa Kunold earned a sixth place on the vault, 8.6.

In other high school action, as of press time the Kingston girls’ basketball team was in a two-way tie for first place in the Olympic League with Olympic and Port Angeles.

The Buccaneers ended their home play with a 43-30 win over Sequim last Friday night. The Bucs haven’t lost a game since coming back from the winter break. After losing two games over the break, Head Coach Kevin Strozier did some soul searching and decided to go back to the basics with his team.

“We’re going to be aggressive, but we’re going to do it the right way,” he said after the Sequim game.

The North Kitsap boys’ varsity basketball team has also been quite a force this season. After a disappointing 2-18 season last year, the Vikings have pulled off a turnaround of magical proportions, ending the season 12-8 with a bid in the district tournament. They began district play last night against Gig Harbor at Stadium in Tacoma. The results of that game were unavailable at press time.

If the Vikings won, they’ll play today at 6 p.m., and if they lost, they’ll play at 3:45 p.m. Either way, they’ll play at Mount Tahoma in Tacoma.

“It’s been a superb year for the Vikings. We’re coming off a 2-18 season and they seem to be playing their best basketball toward the end of the season,” said Head Coach Tony Chisholm.

Chisholm said the keys to this weekends’ matches will be to keep the boys focused on the game at hand and to step it up on defense.

“We’re trying to put North Kitsap basketball on the map and this is a great opportunity to do that. We’ve had a great year. The gym was packed this year. This is a springboard for next season,” Chisholm said.

This year’s season will provide a stable foundation that has been missing in previous years.

“I’m the third coach some of these guys have had,” he said. “We’ve got to have the foundation. Now we have the foundation and it’s stable. Now it’s time to build the frame.”

Wrestlers will also be busy this weekend. Representing North Kitsap in the regionals wrestling tournament today are Megan Evans, who will wrestle in the girls’ tournament at Arlington High in Arlington. Wrestling in the boys’ regionals at Foss High in Tacoma are Jeff Jones, Anthony Lindfors, Paul Coulter, Mike Coulter, Matt Cordell and Justin Swansboro.

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