TACOMA — The white board in North Kitsap’s Mount Tahoma High School locker room Wednesday spelled out succinctly the fate of the boys’ basketball team.

“Win, we move on,” it said. “Lose, season’s over.”

Thankfully for the Viking faithful, North (17-8) chose the former, taking home a 64-56 win versus Bellarmine Prep to keep its post-season alive and can seal a state appearance — the first for NK since 1988 — with a win in its next two games.

“We told the guys, ‘If it’s going to end, it’s going to end at a winner-to-state game,’” said North coach Aaron Nations. “And now we’ve got two chances for that.”

North played Prairie last night in a game after Herald press time. A Viking win versus the Falcons would see them receive a fifth seed state bid. A loss sets up an 8 p.m. game tonight versus the loser of fellow Friday game Curtis and Mount Tahoma.

Regardless of who it plays, North Kitsap must “keep up the defense, polish our offense up, and keep playing as a team,” commented Viking utility man Jeff Ottele.

Wednesday’s game was extremely physical, though North left the pressure on its Lion opponents by never surrendering the lead. At this point, however, Nations said he’s not expecting any freebees or calls to be made on the Vikings’ behalf.

“That’s the playoffs. The refs let it go a little bit more,” he commented. “We’re mentally kicking that in right now.”

The Vikings entered the game with a few of their own hurdles to deal with. Point guard Travis Tobin was injured in PE class earlier in the day and Ryan Young, who has been nursing stress fractures in his shins, has also been battling the flu.

Tobin, though listed as day to day, did not play and Nations had to go deeper into the bench. But Nations said the younger guys came through with superb efforts.

“Our seniors have been stepping up all year long,” Nations said. “But it was nice to see the underclassmen step up as well.”

Young battled through his illness, however, to lead all Vikings’ scorers with 22 points and added five blocks and seven rebounds.

“All these guys have worked so hard this year,” Young said. “This could have been the last game of my high school career. I was going to leave it on the floor and I did.”

The focal point of the Lions’ offense was Brandon Stout, who put up a game-high 25 points, even with the North Kitsap “D” covering him with numerous double teams.

“He’s really good. There’s not much you can do,” said North’s Chris Zeringer, who scored 11 for the Vikings. “Just get a hand in his face and hope he misses.”

“Stout’s going to get his,” Nations added. “But you’ve got to limit what everybody else does.”

North’s seemingly-epidemic lapse at the start of the third quarter showed symptoms Wednesday, prompting Nations to say after the game that, “I wouldn’t mind going down two at the half, so we come out a little more fired up and ready to go.”

Though the Lions got within three points, North’s defense clamped down in the fourth.

“The final four minutes, they really didn’t get a whole lot of looks,” said North assistant coach Duane Petzoldt. “We really tightened down and played good team defense.”

Ultimately, three of the remaining four teams in the consolation draw — NK, Curtis, Prairie and Mount Tahoma — will now move on to state. But being in that position gives the Vikings hope that they’ll go to the state tournament for the first time in 17 years.

“We’re alive,” Nations said. “That was the key.”