HS Boys Hoops: Black Hills remains undefeated in EVCO 2A play with big win over WF West

1/28/2025

Black Hills 48, WF West 38

(Tumwater, WA) There was plenty on the line for both teams when they tipped off on Tuesday night. The WF West Bearcats came in tied at 4-2 with Tumwater for 2nd place. There is a huge difference in placing 2nd and 3rd in the EVCO 2A. The 2nd place finisher will get to host the 3 seed from the GSHL in the opening round of the district tournament and 3rd place will have to play in a play-in game just to get into the district tournament and then will have to travel to a GSHL opponent in the opening round.

Black Hills came in with a 2 game lead over both WF West and Tumwater with a 6-0 league record. A win over the Bearcats would all but clinch the league Championship and #1 seed where they would be hosting the 1st round of districts.

After a low scoring 1st half with the Wolves outscoring the Bearcats 10-9 in the 1st and the Cats 7-6 in the 2nd quarter is was tied 16-16 at the break. Both teams knew that a hot run might be the difference in the game and Black Hills’ Peyton Faught was set on delivering and did so with an opening 3 point bucket and hitting another one on the next possession to give a quick 6 point lead to Black Hills. In fact a lead they would never surrender. Black Hills outscored the Cats 15-5 in the 3rd and led 31-21 after 3. Faught would finish the game with 16.

WF West would not give in though and with about 3 minutes to play in the game had chipped away at that 10 point lead to pull within 4 led by Gage Brumfield who scored 6 of his 7 points in the 4th quarter. Leading Bearcat scorer Weston Potter had 4 of his 14 and Grady Westlund scored all 4 of his in the final 8 minutes as Westlund was hampered with foul trouble but the 6’4 senior did his work as usual in the paint with 12 rebounds.

Black Hills had the answer led by the rebounding and defense of sophomore Tristan Deville who scored only 1 point but had 14 rebounds and multiple steals and blocked shots and did so without committing a single foul. Topping the scorers was James Morgan who had another solid game with 17 points, 4 boards and shut down defense. Morgan got into foul trouble quickly picking up 2 fouls in the first 2 minutes of the game but never fouled again.

Our Thorbeckes MVP of the game went to the Wolves Peyton Faught. Faught hit 2 huge 3 balls to begin the 2nd half and the Wolves took a 6 point lead they would never surrender to win this critical league game.

Black Hills improves to 7-0 in league play and 12-5 overall and will play at Tumwater on Friday with a chance to clinch the league Championship. WF West drops to 4-3 in league play and 8-10 for the year. The Bearcats will travel to Aberdeen on Thursday.

Scoring
Black Hills: James Morgan 17, Peyton Faught 16, Quinton Morrill 9, Talon Morrill 5, Tristan Deville 1
WF West: Weston Potter 14, Gage Brumfield 7, Ross Kelley 6, Grady Westlund 4, Fox Rogerson 3, Wyatt Hoffman 2, Carlos Vallejo 2

Link to watch full game replay on the NFHS Network (subscription required)

ESN Postgame Show