The Northern Lights Conference Basketball Championships open play on Thursday, March 17th with three days of competition at Palmer High School in 4A basketball running March 17-19.
The Soldotna Stars girls enter tournament play as the #5 seed based on regular season, conference games and will open the girls bracket in the 2 p.m. game on Thursday against the host Palmer Moose.
The SoHi boys, seeded #6 in the tournament, will face Palmer in the boy’s 7:15 p.m. game at Palmer High.
SoHi Girls 40 – Palmer 42 Final – SoHi Girls play 10am Friday
The Soldotna Lady Stars completed conference play at 2-8 with a pair of early season victories over the Kodiak Bears in Kodiak. SoHi faced Palmer in the final game of the regular season and fell to the Moose 56-42 with Palmer leading 26-12 at the half; the two teams played evenly, 30 points each, in the second half.
The winner of the SoHi vs Palmer pairing advances to the semi-final to face #1 seed Anchorage Christian School on Friday afternoon. A loss and the Stars move to a consolation game against the Colony/Kodiak loser on Friday morning.
SoHi Boys vs Palmer 7:15 p.m. ESPN 1140AM, 96.9FM and streaming at radiokenai.com
The Soldotna boys, #6 seed into the boy’s tournament bracket, look for their first victory against a conference opponent when SoHi faces Palmer on the Moose’s home court in the 7:15 p.m. game on Friday night.
The Stars have battled all conference teams during the regular season with opportunities to record victories; including a 59-58 loss to the tournament’s #1 seed Colony on the Knight’s home floor.
The winner of the SoHi vs Palmer pairing advances to the semi-final to face #2 seed Kodiak on Friday evening. A loss and the Stars move to a consolation game against the Wasilla/ACS loser on Friday morning.
Northern Lights Conference Information
The Northern Lights Conference is a standard eight-team bracket with the top two team (NLC has only six teams) receiving first-round byes. The NLC owns two, automatic berths to the ASAA 4A State Basketball Championships and third/fourth place teams are eligible for an at-large berth (2 for 4A division) to state.
Tournament Seeds
Girls: #1 ACS, #2 Wasilla, #3 Colony, #4 Palmer, #5 SoHi, #6 Kodiak
Boys: #1 Colony, #2Kodiak, #3 Palmer, #4 ACS, #5 Wasilla, #6 SoHi
NLC Girls Bracket 2022 NLC Boys Basketball Bracket