File photo – The McKinleyville Panthers clinched the Big 5 title outright on Friday night.

The Panthers would not be denied.

After clinching at least a co-championship in Big 5 boys basketball on Wednesday night, McKinleyville needed one more win to secure the title outright, and on Friday night the players delivered with a comfortable 66-40 win over Fortuna at Mack High.

Also in the Big 5 on Friday night, the Del Norte Warriors took big step towards securing a place in this year’s Dick Niclai tournament with arguably their most complete team performance of the season.

The Del Norte boys welcomed Eureka to Crescent City and overcame a slow start on the way to a 78-70 win, improving to 3-4 in the Big 5 and dropping the Loggers to 2-4.

The conference title is the Panthers’ second in three years, but it was the school’s first-ever outright.

“Couldn’t be more happy for our boys and coaching staff to claim our school’s first-ever outright league championship,” McKinleyville head coach Chris Davis said. “This was a goal from the start, and I’m so happy that the boys get to have this forever. This is a great group of kids and they’ve earned it.”

Fortuna head coach Norm Sotomayor congratulated the league champs on their success.

“There is a reason they are league champs,” he said. “Coach Davis has done a great job with his team and program and I applaud his success.”

It was Senior Night for the Panthers and the seniors played a key role in the victory and the march towards the historic championship, including team captains Bode Douglass, Neil Moon and Henry Turner.

Douglass finished with a team-high 14 points, while Moon added 12 and Turner had 11 points.

Another McKinleyville senior, James Fike, added nine points.

The seniors knew what was at stake.

“Our seniors brought great energy from the start of the game and got us off to a great start,” Davis said. “James was flying all over the court and was a great spark for us from the tip.

“Bode once again is showing more and more improvement game after game. He added some nice poised takes to the hoop mixed in with some good kickouts to shooters.

“Jeremiah (Smith) and Ray (Turner) were once again providing solid pressure along the perimeter, making their guards uncomfortable and then were good pushing the ball in transition or off turnovers.

“Henry and Neil shared the ball really well tonight while still making good decisions with the shots they took.”

Al in all, it was a well-rounded team performance.

Friday’s win not only secured the Big 5 championship, but also gives the Panthers (17-7 overall) a top seed and opening-round bye for the upcoming Dick Niclai tournament.

With the loss, the Huskies dropped to 0-6 in the Big 5 and 7-17 on the season.

No scoring stats were immediately available for Fortuna, but the players earned the respect of the Panthers coaches.

“Norm continuously gets his guys ready to play,” Davis said. “I can’t express enough how much I respect him and his staff for getting his guys to play hard each and every game.”

File photo

File photo – The Fortuna Huskies