Chief Leschi and North Beach will not be allowed to play in the 2019 Southwest Washington District IV Boys Basketball Tournament after a vote of the Pacific League athletic directors via email Friday as a result of a brawl that took place during last Thursday night's game between the Warriors and the Hyaks at Oyehut.
The brawl got started when a fight broke out on the court between two players and the benches of both teams and about 75 people in attendance ran onto the floor. The game was immediately cancelled.
As a result of being tossed out of the tournament, South Bend was allowed into the tournament as the number seven seed and Raymond was moved up to the No. 6 seed.
"The majority voted against allowing them to play," South Bend Athletic Director and Pacific League President Tom Sanchez told the Herald. "It's not a pleasant deal. No one was removed. They are not allowed to participate. The timing of the whole thing was a problem."
It is important to note that only the WIAA is allowed to ban teams from a tournament.
Sanchez released a statement Friday afternoon, "Due to the incident at North Beach HS last night in their boys basketball game with Chief Leschi, (the) Pacific League has denied the North Beach and Chief Leschi boys basketball teams entry into the district tournament.
"Raymond moves into the 6th place position and South Bend moves into the 7th spot."
Both Chief Leschi and North Beach were assessed forfeit losses, giving each team a league record of 7-11.
Chief Leshi and North Beach entered the game with identical league records of 7-10 and tied for sixth place. The winner would have ended up tied for fifth place with Ocosta (8-10) and the loser would been been tied for seventh place with Raymond (7-11), so a tiebreaker game to get into the tournament would have been played Saturday night to determine the seventh and final seed. South Bend actually finished in ninth place with league record of 2-16.
The Seagulls (7-13) were scheduled to host Morton-White Pass (12-8) in a loser-out game last night at Seagull gym. The winner advanced to play Kalama Thursday at 7:30 pm at W.F. West HS. South Bend (3-17) was scheduled to play at Wahkiakum (8-12) last night at 7 pm.
However, Chief Leschi and North Beach could appeal the decision to the WIAA and possibly one team could get reinstated and South Bend could get bumped. It was not known at press time if there were any appeals. North Beach, the WIAA and Chief Leschi did not return phone calls to the Herald.
In other league news, the North Beach Lady Hyaks defeated Pe Ell Saturday in a tie-breaker game to determine the seventh seed in the girls tournament. Both teams finshed the regular season with 5-13 league records.