Colony hosting NLC basketball tournaments

Colony High School was set to host the Northern Lights Conference Championships last year. But as Alaska entered the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic in March of 2020, the high school basketball season came to an abrupt end just days before the region tourney.

This year, there will be a NLC tournament. The championships start Thursday and continue through Saturday at Colony High.

The Colony Knights are the top seeds in both the boys and girls brackets. Colony, Palmer and Wasilla all start their tournaments in the boys and girls semifinal rounds Friday. On the boys’ side, top-seed Colony will face the Soldotna-Kodiak winner Friday at 8 p.m. Second-seeded Palmer plays third-seeded Wasilla Friday at 4 p.m. in the other semifinal.

In the girls bracket, first seed Colony meets the Soldotna-Kodiak winner Friday at 6 p.m. Second-seeded Wasilla plays third-seeded Palmer Friday at 2 p.m.

The fourth-seeded Soldotna Stars and fifth-seeded Kodiak Bears open the tournament on Thursday with the girls and boys games at 6 p.m. and 8 p.m.

The winners of the semifinal games in both brackets advance to the NLC title game and earn an automatic bid to the ASAA 4A state tournament. The girls title game is Saturday at 5 p.m and the boys championship is Saturday at 7 p.m.

There is also an opportunity to play for third place in the conference. The loser of the Soldotna-Kodiak games on each bracket face the lowest seed to lose on Friday in an elimination game Saturday morning, 9 a.m. for the girls and 11 a.m. for the boys. The winners of each of those games advance to the third-place games to play the highest seed with a loss on Friday. Those games are scheduled for 1 p.m. and 3 p.m.

Attendance is limited to those who receive entry passes from the teams, but the entire tournament will be live streamed at https://www.matsuk12.us/chs.

Contact the Frontiersman at sports@frontiersman.com.