LBCC basketball season officially ended on Thursday, March 7, with the Beaks men falling 85-71 to 24-5 Skagit Valley in the Sweet 16 round of the NWAC Playoffs.
For the game, freshman Cade Smith led the Beaks with 20 points, while sophomores T.J. Zimmermann and Bennet Bos contributed 18 and 17, respectively. Zimmermann led the team in rebounds with 10 on the night.
Skagit Valley has since emerged as one of the strongest teams in the tournament, advancing to the Final Four with a chance to play in the championship with a win on Saturday.
The loss leaves Linn-Benton with a 15-14 regular season record (9-7 in conference), the team’s first winning regular season since the 2018-19 season. The Beaks have made the playoffs every season under second-year head coach Todd Zimmermann, but they have yet to advance past the first round.
Thursday’s playoff matchup marked the last game in a Roadrunners uniform for several sophomores on the men’s team, including Zimmermann, Davion Burdette, Bos, Tre Cannon, Kamana Lapina, and Anders Turman. However, none will be a bigger loss than Zimmermann, who led the Beaks in points per game and rebounds per game during the season with 21.6 and 10.4, respectively, with no close seconds in either category.
The sophomore forward ended the season with one of the best careers LBCC basketball has ever seen, with the second-most all-time points in school history. Zimmermann was also honored by the NWAC conference, winning first team All-NWAC South for the second consecutive season in 2024.
Zimmermann, Burdette, and Bos made up three of the Beaks’ top four scorers during the season, but LBCC still has strong freshman talent to build on this offseason. Freshman wing Cade Smith finished second on the Beaks in points per game and rebounds per game with 12.6 and 5.3, respectively. Additionally, young talents like Cedric Barnes, Liam Spencer, and Michael Lundy all saw plenty of minutes during the year, bringing experience into the upcoming season.
The season didn’t end the way the Beaks hoped, but it still showed plenty of positives, marking one of the strongest two-year stretches for the program in recent history.
LBCC Baseball Begins NWAC South Play
After weather issues gave LBCC baseball an unexpected bye week to begin March, the Beaks finally opened NWAC South play, beginning March with a three-game winning streak. LBCC swept Chemeketa in a double-header on March 7 with wins of 12-0 and 2-0. On the 9th, they split a two-game series with Umpqua, with a 2-1 win and a 3-2 loss in their final game of the week.
The team now sits at 7-5 on the season with an initial conference record of 3-1.
Beaks baseball has six-straight home games up next, starting with a double-header against Mt. Hood, with the first game beginning at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, March 13.
