Building on a very prolific early season, Arcata High’s standout student-athlete Luke Lemke set a new standard for himself Thursday night at home against Fortuna in boys basketball, notching a remarkable 51 points in the Tigers’ 71-53 win, a great bounceback from Arcata’s last outing, a heartbreaking 62-61 last-second loss at Del Norte on Tuesday to start conference play.
Fortuna was coming off a 56-52 victory over Hoopa at home on Tuesday that wasn’t secured until the final seconds, a Gavin Mayberry dunk providing a late lift after the Warriors tied the game at 46 late, Fortuna having been up at the half 28-20. According to Fortuna athletics’ Dennis Rosser, Tanner Franklin also hit a crucial three down the stretch to take the lead to 51-46 before two Will Shaw free throws and one free throw and a driving two by Rawland Bones with 12.5 seconds left for the Huskies made it 54-50. Shaw had a steal in the waning moments to secure the victory, Jack Stacy scoring 13 and Bones and Mayberry 12. Rosser said Hoopa was led by Malaki McCoy’s 16 with 4 3-pointers. Ish E-Kor had 11 and Brian Richards had 10.
Husky head coach Norm Sotomayor said, “When you look at Hoopa’s schedule, they’ve played some tough games and play a great brand of basketball and Inker (head coach McCovey) has them playing well and believing, so we knew it would be a battle going in. We seemed to control the game, having a lead of nine points at times, and every time we’d turn the ball over, they’d hit a three or have an offensive rebound and putback. They kept it close and always were within striking distance.”
Sotomayor said the fourth quarter got tight with some uncharacteristic Husky turnovers and travels, with bad ballhandling and decision-making, “trying hard to give them the game, but Gavin Mayberry had a big dunk for a momentum swing, and we had some big free throws late, which was nice.”
Sotomayor knew Arcata with their home crowd and battle-tested squad after a tough non-conference schedule would be a challenge. He did say his squad was “climbing the ladder” in terms of getting their football players acclimated after their deep playoff run, and getting “where we need to be,” saying they were really riding Mayberry’s back in terms of rebounds and offense.
“I like the direction we’re headed,” he said Wednesday.
Ken McCanless
Luke Lemke goes up for two against Red Bluff in early-season tournament play. Lemke scored 51 against Fortuna on Thursday night. (Ken McCanless/Times-Standard file photo)
But Lemke presented an otherworldly obstacle Thursday night. Lemke, also star quarterback of the Tigers’ state-championship-winning football team in 2024, continues to raise the bar, even against a Husky defense that was geared toward stopping him.
“It was a great bounce-back game for us after such a gut-punch and tough loss Tuesday up at Del Norte,” said Arcata head coach Kellen Maynard. It was good to see the guys come back in a game where Fortuna played extremely well and gave us everything we could handle. I’m impressed and happy with the way the guys played overall, wasn’t happy with the way it started, but once we settled in I thought we played much better the rest of the night.”
Arcata trailed 7-2 early, but Maynard has usually made it a point to say he didn’t want to “hold the hand” of his team in trying to let them figure out issues on their own instead of calling timeout. However, after a good practice, he thought his squad had a tough hangover from Tuesday night’s loss and deviated from that strategy. “I felt we were tight and not playing our flow,” and so he took timeout, he said.
After that, the home team relaxed, and Lemke began to cook. “I’ve been around the kid for four years now,” Maynard said. “Nothing he does surprises me; I see every day with his work ethic and his attitude, the way he handles himself and what he does. He works harder than anybody I’ve been around, and I’ve been around a lot of hard workers. He’s right up there with them, and a performance like that, while the total is surprising, especially for a 32-minute basketball game, against a defense for Fortuna really geared toward stopping him, was extremely impressive. The performance itself and doing it, I’m not surprised he was the one that did it… he prepares for moments like that all the time.”
Maynard made sure to mention that Arcata still had to function as a team, get stops defensively, and “guys like Heron Cromwell or Eoin McGoldrick were huge defensively, especially in the second half, keeping Fortuna out of the paint and attacking their ballhandlers, making sure that what they wanted to do on the perimeter was tough.”
Cromwell, in particular, got credit for stepping up inside with Jack Luh’s injury, doing an “admirable job” stepping in defensively in the post while undersized. Moving forward to their next action Thursday at 7:30 p.m. at McKinleyville, Maynard said the bye week would be nice and hopefully the squad can “build off how we’re progressing in the season and be up for McKinleyville in a showdown that’s always exciting and action-packed.”
Arcata is 7-12 (1-1 Big Five Conference) while Fortuna goes to 6-11 (0-1) with a Saturday 7:30 p.m. tip at Ferndale on the horizon.
Ken McCanless can be reached at 707-441-0526.