Monroe boys basketball wins Snohomish rematch

Published 1:45 am Thursday, January 29, 2026

SNOHOMISH — Isaiah Kiehl had one thing in mind entering the third quarter at Snohomish High School on Wednesday.

Monroe boys basketball carried a 30-24 halftime lead against the home side, and the Bearcats junior recognized they needed to create more distance against a Snohomish team that beat them 56-55 on their home court on Jan. 14, when a massive run in the third quarter set the stage for junior Grady Rohrich to hit a go-ahead, fadeaway jumper in the final 10 seconds to secure the win.

“I think coming out of that locker room in the third quarter, I’d say, is when my brain was really— I was like, ‘This is when we need to come out and punch them in the throat,’” Kiehl said. “And I think we did that.”

After a scoreless 90 seconds to start the second half, Monroe senior Wyatt Prohn knocked down a 3-pointer to extend the lead to nine, and while Snohomish senior Hudson Smith responded with a putback layup at the other end, Monroe senior Dominic Castillo — who got into foul trouble early in the first half — made the most of his reduced playing time by completing an ‘And-1,’ then grabbing a steal and drawing a foul in back-to-back possessions.

Kiehl followed that up by delivering a throat-punch 3-pointer with just under five minutes left in the quarter to make it 39-26, building up what would be an insurmountable lead as the Bearcats (15-2, 7-1 league) held on for a 67-58 win against the Panthers (12-7, 6-2 league), breaking a tie atop Wesco North 3A/2A with just two games left in the regular season to put Monroe firmly in the driver’s seat to win the league title for the second straight year.

Kiehl led Monroe with 15 points and six rebounds, while senior Caleb Campbell (six rebounds, three blocks) and Prohn (four 3-pointers) each scored 14 points. The trio led the charge for a motivated group looking to avenge the loss in their previous matchup.

“The big thing was rebounding,” Campbell said. “That’s a big, physical team, and we (put) a lot of emphasis on rebounding. Last time, they took it to us, and the first half of this game, they had zero offensive rebounds, for one. So I think that was the big deciding factor early in the game.”

Rohrich scored a game-high of 27 points, sinking five 3’s, and junior Deyton Wheat chipped in 16 for Snohomish, which lost for the first time this calendar year. The Panthers won eight straight following their loss to Columbia River on Dec. 30.

“I still feel good about our team,” Snohomish coach Jeff Larson said. “(Monroe coach) Justin (Prohn) does a great job with (the Bearcats), and obviously they got big time, big game experience. Those players made big plays when they needed to. … We’re okay. This doesn’t deflate us. We’re not down. We really needed a game like this to understand what the next level looks like and feels like. Monroe did what we would expect a district championship team to do.”

If the officials were paid by the number of times they blew their whistles on Wednesday, they would no longer need to work. The two teams combined for 40 free throws attempts, with at least one side, if not both, flying past the bonus in each quarter. Three different players fouled out, and even more had to sit out extended minutes after entering foul trouble.

With little leniency and frequent stops affecting the flow of the game, it came down to which team could adjust better. Even after the Bearcats picked up three team fouls in the first 49 seconds of the second quarter, they did not put the Panthers in the bonus until 55.4 seconds before halftime.

“There’s an impact there that’s hard to sometimes prepare for and coach for,” Justin Prohn said. “So I think our ability to stay aggressive and be smart at certain times really helped us a little bit. I think our depth — we had Liam Reed (six points) and Chris Britt (two points, two rebounds), who are two of our reserves — they really came in and played just with some confidence and (freedom) tonight.”

It was a fast start for both teams, who scored on each of their first three possessions of the game. Castillo hit a layup to make it 8-6 with 6:03 left in the first, and the Bearcats forced a Snohomish shot clock violation to end the two-sided scoring run. A pair of 3’s from Wyatt Prohn and Britt, respectively, would extend the lead to 16-8 before a jumper from Wheat and three free throws from senior Hudson Smith helped cut the deficit to 19-13 by the end of the quarter.

Britt opened the second quarter by scoring a layup off a flashy behind-the-back pass from Kiehl with 6:40 left in the frame, but Rohrich started to heat up for the Panthers, knocking down a corner 3 nearly a minute later to cut it to 23-18, and knocking down two tough jump shots down the stretch — one a fadeaway at a tough angle, and the other using his body to create separation. Rohrich sank a pair of free throws to close the half with his side trailing 30-24.

“(Rohrich) is a game-changer for them, and can really light it up,” Justin Prohn said. “Really good basketball player, and he makes their team a lot different.”

After the Bearcats opened the third on a 9-2 run, capped by Kiehl’s timely 3-pointer, Wyatt Prohn knocked down two more 3-pointers, which were Monroe’s only made field goals in the final five minutes before the fourth, due to all the trips to the charity stripe on the other possessions. His fourth and final one of the night came with under 30 seconds before the break, which extended the lead to 49-35 before Snohomish junior Jack Rotondo swished a 3 at the buzzer to cut it to 49-38.

“(Wyatt Prohn) adds a whole other dimension to our offense,” Kiehl said. “I mean, if teams are feeling like they have to come out on him, it creates driving lanes for everyone else. And then once I get in that driving lane and then they’re sagging off him, then you get it right back to him.”

Wheat cut the deficit to 49-40 on the first shot of the fourth quarter, but Reed responded with a layup before grabbing a defensive rebound at the other end. With the ball back in Kiehl’s hands, the 6-foot-2 guard started to drive into the lane before finding Campbell under the basket, where he completed a reverse layup to make it 53-40 with just over seven minutes left.

Campbell later extended the lead to 15, muscling his way past two defenders to convert an ‘And-1.’ He screamed and flexed his arms downwards before sinking the free throw to make it 60-45 with 4:38 remaining.

The magnitude of the celebration matched the magnitude of the moment. Despite two late 3-pointers from Rohrich and another at the buzzer from junior Grant Smith, the Panthers ran out of time to make a comeback, and the 67-58 final put Monroe on the doorstep of back-to-back league titles.

However, with matchups against Marysville-Getchell and Marysville-Pilchuck still on the docket, the Bearcats plan to take care of business one game at a time, not celebrating anything until it’s mathematically locked up. Justin Prohn even evoked Mike Macdonald, paraphrasing the Super Bowl-bound Seahawks coach’s message regarding Seattle’s path to the NFC title.

“What did Mike Macdonald say in the Seahawks game? ‘We don’t care?’” Justin Prohn said, half-jokingly. “To be honest, it’s just one game at a time. We are not overlooking Marysville-Getchell. … It’s high school basketball, anything can happen. There’s illnesses going around. There’s a lot of things that can happen, but for us right now, we’re just trying to play better and get to our standard, so that when the districts come around, hopefully we’re playing our best basketball at that time.

“Because nobody’s won anything yet.”