By Ray Hamill — This one obviously meant just a little bit more.

After seeing their Dick Niclai Tournament ambitions derailed in heartbreaking fashion on a buzzer-beater a year ago, the Arcata Tigers made sure there would be no disappointing ending this time around.

On Friday night, in front of a large crowd at Lumberjack Arena, the Arcata players ended an eight-year wait to add to their record tally of tournament trophies, holding on late for a 64-60 win over Big 5 rival Eureka in the championship game.

They had to battle for it, but the players answered the call every time the Loggers made a run.

“It was a battle,” Arcata head coach Charlie Espinoza said. “The sisterhood that we’re building here is what takes us to the next level. Things can go wrong, we love each other, we build each other up, and we can now handle that adversity.”

The Tigers trailed by eight midway through the third quarter, but would close out the period on a 17-1 run to take control, and they never trailed again.

The Loggers, to their credit, continued to battle with a strong start to the fourth quarter, cutting the deficit to three less than three minutes into the period.

But once again, perhaps spurred on by last year’s disappointment, the Tigers answered the call, led by senior twin sisters Tae and Mae Wolford.

Tae had an incredible night in one of the biggest games of her young career and finished with a game-high 32 points, including 16 in the third quarter to help spark the big run, while Mae added 17 points.

The Loggers would cut the deficit to just two on a Nashya Williams free throw with 50 seconds remaining in the game, but the Tigers would hold on late, icing the win with a pair of free throws by Colby Eisner with three seconds on the clock.

“They believed in each other, they believed in themselves when maybe things didn’t go our way,” Espinoza said. “Tae is the best leader that I’ve ever had as a coach, she’s just pulling these girls together, building them up and saying ‘we’re fine, we’ve got this.’ And they truly believed it, and that’s a difference maker right there.”

Photos by Ray Hamill/HumboldtSports.com

The Eureka girls never gave up the fight.

“I thought we played well, but it’s the little things,” Eureka head coach Cliff Napoleon said. “We just came up short.

“I like that we didn’t give up, even when we were down 10 or 11, we still fought back and kept chiseling away.”

Junior Tiarah Maualuga was instrumental in that, not just with her play but also with the way she inspired her teammates.

“Tiarah was a great leader and really rallied the troops,” Napoleon said. 

The Loggers were led offensively by Madelyn Fazio, who had 16 points, while Violla Kingsang added 15 points and Maualuga finished with 13 points.

Williams chipped in eight points, all of them in the second half.

Free throws played a part in the outcome.

“True, we’d like to win the game, but I wasn’t disappointed,” Napoleon added. “Arcata did well. They played hard. They made the shots. We kept putting them at the free-throw line and they made them.”

The Dick Niclai championship is the 12th all-time for the Tigers, who are the most successful program in tournament history.

Afterwards Espinoza admitted he had been thinking about last year’s championship game loss to St. Bernard’s all week.

“Last year was a heartbreaker and I watched that video probably every day this week,” he said. “You know, I really wanted to kind of have that chip on my shoulder and play that way.”

This was the Arcata coach’s first Niclai tournament title.

“It meant everything to me to win it with the twins in their senior year, and Mia Cueto,” Espinzoa said. “Those three have been with me since I took over. They were the three sophomores that I brought up,  and to just win it with those three meant everything to me.”

The Arcata head coach also praised the performance of the Loggers and one player in particular.

“Violla, I got so much respect for her,” he said of Kingsang. “She is a basketball player, downhill, she’s sneaky, she gets through the cracks, she finishes tough buckets, she is a tough girl to plan for because you really don’t know what you get from her.”