“This championship means a lot, especially considering how strong our region is,” said Lone Peak coach Quincy Lewis. “There are a lot of good teams.

“We talked in the locker room about not wanting to share the region title, and we didn’t,” he added.

The game started out pretty slowly as both teams played tough defense and exchanged possessions without posting any points often in the first quarter.

The Knights owned a slight 9-6 advantage at the end of the first period, but mounted a 9-2 run to open the second quarter.

First Tyler Haws hit a pair of free throws, then Bracken Funk found Landon Clegg in the key for a short jumper. The Cavemen then scored, but Funk answered immediately with a trey.

Clegg added two more foul shots and Dillon Smith hit Josh Sharp inside to push the advantage to double digits. The team eventually manufactured a 26-10 lead at the break.

Shumway and Brady Mason immediately reduced the gap to 10 with back-to-back treys to start the third period, but Lone Peak responded with four straight points from Clegg.

American Fork continued to scrap and was particularly impressive running the floor to counter the Knight fast breaks, but the Cavemen were never able to reduce the deficit to single digits.

“Any time you play those guys, you have to earn it,” Lewis said. “American Fork is a smart team. You have to value each possession if you’re going to beat them, and we did that.

“Overall, our half-court defense was very good,” the coach continued. “We picked it up in the second half and they had to make tough shots.”

As for the Knights, they missed their first field goal attempt of the third but then made 11 in a row. The highlight, however, came in the fourth quarter, when Haws faked out his defenders to get the ball to Sharp inside for a dunk that got great crowd reaction.

The Jesters also called for senior reserve Tyler Gentry late in the game and roared with approval when he and senior Jake Palmer were subbed in to finish their final game on the home court.

Two starters had just two points between them, but the team still had four players in double figures, led by Funk with 16, including Lone Peak’s only two treys of the game. He was also the assist leader with four, but six other players also had assists and the team had a very impressive ratio of 19 assists on 20 field goals.

Clegg added 15, Josh Sharp had 14 off the bench and Tyler Haws got 13. The Knights shot 91.7 percent of their field goals in the second half, 64.5 percent for the night. They were also 76.9 percent from the line.

The rest of the floor game stats were spread out too.

“That’s what’s so special about this team,” Lewis said. “Every player contributes, and a different guy steps up every game when we need him to.”

Lone Peak finishes the regular season at 20-1, 9-1 in region, and will open the state tournament Tuesday at 5:50 p.m. against Region 1 No. 5 Viewmont at Weber State’s Dee Events Center.

“Now we can focus our attention on that first (playoff) game,” the coach said. “Preparation for that first one is all that matters.”

JV wins 54-39: The Knights blew open a close game in the fourth quarter to get the victory. Brian Hale led the effort with 16 points, six rebounds, three assists and a pair of steals.

Kimball Payne added 12 points and six assists, Josh Sharp had 10 boards and Justin Hamilton had nine points, five rebounds and four blocks.

Sophs rule 65-32: Lone Peak held the Cavemen to single digits in three of four periods on their way to a blowout win. Every player on the roster had a chance to show his stuff in this final contest for this team.

Twelve players scored, led by Nate Austin and Brandon Smith with nine apiece. Eleven players had rebounds, with Mike Wilson and Dallin Ott at five each.

Seven players had assists, with Brandon Reeves at the top of the list with four. Garrett Lyman had four among seven players with steals. Keenan Larsen had three blocks and Blake Lewis two.

Feb.14 — Lone Peak 87, Timpanogos 52: At Orem, Lone Peak took over sole possession of first place in Region 4 behind a school-record eight 3-pointers from Ryan Rios and thanks to American Fork’s win over Spanish Fork.

Rios led Lone Peak with a career-high 25 points and also had seven assists. He was 8-for-10 in field goals, all of them taken from beyond the arc.

Bracken Funk had an outstanding overall game with eight points, nine boards, five steals and four assists. Tyler Haws scored 16 and Josh Sharp added 12 points and five rebounds for the Knights.

Landon Clegg had nine points, six assists and four rebounds, while Kevin Lindquist grabbed 10 boards and made a pair of blocks. Jake Palmer came off the bench for seven points, five rebounds and two assists.

Lone Peak got the juices going from the opening whistle as Funk won the tip and later fed Rios for his first trey to open the game. Funk got his next assist by giving a bounce pass to Lindquist on the baseline for a basket and one.

Then it was Clegg’s turn in the spotlight. He sank a trey off a pass from Rios, then took another one for an alley-oop dunk.

Not long after, Funk stole the ball and went the distance on the fast break to finish with a long leaner. Following a couple more exchanges, Rios hit Haws outside for the third Knight trey of the period and a 16-6 advantage at the end of the quarter which was never threatened.

Lone Peak posted 25 assists on 30 field goals and outrebounded the T’Wolves 40-19 in the contest. The Knights shot a red-hot 64 percent of their field goals, 57 percent of their treys and 87.5 percent of their free throws in the first half.

“This was a good win,” said coach Quincy Lewis. “This shows that the kids want to win a region championship. Palmer came in and did a great job and Sharp too.

“The score doesn’t show it, but we felt this was a dangerous game after what (the T’Wolves) did at PG.” Timpanogos lost but pushed the Vikings to double overtime.

“Our emphasis in this game was to make the extra pass and the kids shared the ball well all night,” the coach went on. “We wanted to come out and do that, and there’s no question that we did.

“We played better defense in the second half. Landon did a great job opposing their best scorer. He still got some points, but all of them were tough ones.”

Skyler Halford, Ryan Clarke and Nate Henshaw were all held to 12 points and no one else got more than six for Timpanogos, despite the eight treys that the team posted for the evening.

“That Pleasant Grove game took a little bit out of them,” Lewis said. “They’re a better team than they showed tonight, but we’re just playing really well right now.”

JV blitzes T’Wolves 77-36: Lone Peak outshot the host 38-20 in the first half, and the final two quarters were even more lopsided as they rolled to a big win.

The Knights got contributions from everyone on the roster, starting with 17 points from Josh Sharp, 16 points and six boards from Nate Austin, and 12 points plus five rebounds and four steals from Brian Hale.

Kimball Payne had 11 assists and Dillon Smith added four, Justin Hamilton had five boards and two blocks and Keenan Larsen made three steals.

Sophs win 55-44: Lone Peak did not shoot a great percentage and the teams played even through the first half, but a 22-8 scoring explosion in the third quarter put the Knights up for good.

Nate Austin led the effort with 14 points and 11 rebounds, Garrett Lyman added 12 points and three steals and Brandon Smith scored 10.

Chandler Allphin grabbed nine boards and Keenan Larsen six for Lone Peak.

Feb. 16 — Lone Peak 65, Mountain View 40: At Orem, Kevin Lindquist scored 16 points with five rebounds to lead Lone Peak past Mountain View in Region 4.

Tyler Haws added 12 points, going 10-of-11 from the line, and Ryan Rios scored 11 as nine different Knights posted points in the game. Rios added seven assists, five steals and three boards.

Lone Peak led by 10 after three quarters, then blew out the Bruins with a 22-7 final period.

Ahead by just four at the break, the Knights began to build some separation at the start of the third. A deflected shot by Landon Clegg produced a Bracken Funk steal, and Funk gave the ball to Haws for a drive-in deuce.

Lindquist then stole the ball and made the outlet pass to Clegg, who sprinted the length of the court and split a pair of defenders to finish the layup from a very tough angle.

Funk grabbed a defensive board to produce another Mountain View turnover, and Lone Peak converted on the opportunity when Haws gave an alley-oop pass to Clegg for the dunk.

The Bruins managed to cut into the gap a couple of times later in the third period, but another run to start the fourth put the game out of reach for good.

“This win makes us region champs,” said coach Quincy Lewis. “That was our first goal for this season.” At this point, the Knights still had Tuesday’s game against American Fork left, but could do no worse than a tie for the title if they lost and the Dons won.

Lindquist got 12 of his points in the first half, most of them coming on dizzying post moves underneath the basket. He also had a solid floor game during the stretch and even fed Rios for the first of his three treys.

“I thought Kevin and Ryan really carried us in the first half,” the coach went on. Besides being team high scorer, Lindquist tied a school record by taking three charges in the contest.

“In the second half, we needed to raise our level of intensity, and we did,” Lewis said. “Ryan did a great job helping out on (Holden) Jasper.”

Jasper led all scorers with 18 points, but he had to earn them. Taylor Russell added 11 for the Bruins but was only 3-for-12 from the field. These two were the focus of Lone Peak’s defensive efforts.

“I thought Dillon, Josh (Sharp) and Jake (Palmer) each did a nice job off the bench for us,” the coach added.

Sharp had eight points and four rebounds, while Funk added 10 boards. The team outrebounded the Bruins 26-12, had 11 steals without giving up even one, and were 15-of-18 (83 percent) from the line.

JV earns 84-44 blowout: All of Lone Peak’s players made contributions and five scored in double figures as the Knights manhandled the overmatched Bruins. The team was up 46-22 at the half and shared the minutes generously the rest of the game.

Ten scorers were led by Brian Hale with 15, 12 each from Justin Hamilton, Josh Sharp and Kimball Payne, plus 10 from Gabe Smith. Nate Austin was the leading rebounder with seven, Hamilton had six blocks and Payne finished with nine assists and four steals.

Sophs come up short: Lone Peak was unable to hold off a determined comeback by Mountain View in the fourth quarter and lost 62-61.

Leading scorers were Mike Wilson with 16 and Brandon Smith with 12. Nate Austin was the top rebounder with eight and Brandon Reeves had five assists.