Wheat Ridge boys basketball grinds out win over rival Lakewood

WHEAT RIDGE — The crowd might be as large from decades past but make no mistake, the Lakewood/Wheat Ridge boys basketball rivalry still has some juice.

“I told our guys yesterday in practice when I was in high school here we didn’t care about Golden. We didn’t play Golden. This was the game,” Wheat Ridge graduate and now head boys basketball coach Vince Dowd said of the Lakewood/Wheat Ridge rivalry on the hardwood. “I’ve been in this gym before when its to the rafters when we played Lakewood. They knew yesterday how important it is to me. I still love beating Lakewood.”

Beating Lakewood is exactly what the Farmers did on their home court Tuesday night. Wheat Ridge (2-0 record) needed a late fourth-quarter run to hold off Lakewood (0-3). The Farmers eventually came away with a 68-56 victory.

“This is a rivalry game, especially for me,” Wheat Ridge senior Isaac McCune said of the annual showdown against Lakewood that has been close games each of the previous three meetings. “This is 100 percent a rivalry game. All these seniors believe this is one of our biggest games of the year.”

Wheat Ridge seemed to be well in control jumping out to a 50-35 lead early in the fourth quarter. However, Lakewood coach Ed Corridori put a full-court press on the Farmers that nearly pulled off an improbable comeback. 

The Tigers went on a 11-0 run over the span of two minutes to trim the Farmers’ lead to 50-46 with 4:43 left in the fourth quarter.

“This is our third game this season where we’ve been down by double-digit points,” Corridori said. “The boys fight back hard. I love their passion, aggression and fight. Those are the positive things we’ll take away.”

It wasn’t a pretty fourth quarter as Wheat Ridge was finally able to have some success against the Tigers’ full-court press and eventually regain that double-digit lead in the final minute.

“Turnovers, throwing the ball around, throwing the ball over teammate’s head, dribbling the ball out of bounces or off our foot,” McCune described the rash of turnovers in the fourth quarter for the Farmers. “We did come back from that. We have seven seniors that have experience and have been in games like this.”

McCune finished with 13 points, including hitting two free throws in the final seconds. Senior Isaiah Rainalter led all scorers with 24 points, which included four 3-pointers.

“He (Rainalter) is a microwave,” Dowd said of the Farmers’ leading scorer Tuesday night. “He can make four or five 3-pointers in a row really fast. He came into the season with a ton of confidence. He had a good summer and is playing really good right now.”

Wheat Ridge has a loaded end of the week playing in the Glenwood Springs Tournament on Dec. 12-14. The Farmers have games against Basalt, Montrose and Glenwood Springs on the Western Slope.

“Playing three games in a row is going to be tough,” Dowd admitted. “We are playing three good teams up there. More than anything, spending time as a team is going to be good. It is going to be a good trip.”

Senior Quentin Wilson (14 points) and sophomore Marcus Bane (10 points) led the Tigers in the loss.

Lakewood also has a busy week with three games in four days. The Tigers are back in action at home against area-rival Green Mountain at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 12. Lakewood is then on the road against Denver South on Friday, Dec. 13.

“I love these rivalries between Wheat Ridge, Lakewood, Green Mountain and Golden. It is fun to be apart of this,” Corridori said. “I love seeing the fans going crazy. I want these kids to experience it. That is what high school basketball is all about.”