CALDWELL — Twelve months ago, Rockland walked out of Caldwell High School in stunned silence, a double-digit lead against Challis gone and a trip to the state title game with it.

On Friday, the Bulldogs came back and finished the job.

They rolled past fifth-seeded Carey 68-29 in a Class 1A State Tournament semifinal for their first championship game appearance in four years.

No. 1 Rockland (24-2) will play No. 3 Garden Valley (22-2) in the Class 1A State Championship game at 9:30 a.m. Saturday inside the Ford Idaho Center in Nampa.

“It’s just been that revenge tour ever since that moment last year,” Rockland head coach Shae Neal said. “The whole goal was to work all season long and just get that monkey off our back.”

The “monkey” Neal is referring to is Challis.

The Bulldogs had swept the Vikings during the regular season by a combined 34 points, and they seemed well on their way to a third win when they jumped out to a double-digit first-half lead in last year’s semifinal at this same building.

But Rockland let it slip away. With a chance to win it, senior Woodrow Lowder was off on a corner 3 and junior Ethan Permann threw the ball out of bounds on a crucial possession in the final seconds, leading to a stunning 52-49 loss.

It was the Bulldogs’ second semifinal loss and third by six points or fewer at state in the last three seasons.

“We knew we had our shot, we knew we could do it,” Permann said. “We just didn’t execute when we needed to. It really, really stung to lose a game we could have — should have — won.”

And with all but two players back from last year’s debacle, that sting never fully went away — nor did they want it to.

“Every time we’re running, every time we’re doing a drill, it’s — is this a championship effort?” Neal said. “Those failures are good motivations to really hammer down and remind us that we can get better every day.”

On Friday, they took it out on Carey.

Rockland couldn’t have asked for a better start.

Lowder’s layup 29 seconds into the game ignited an 18-0 run that nearly spanned the length of the quarter — nine of those points came from Lowder himself.

The fifth-seeded Panthers (16-9) didn’t score their first points until Carter Olsen pulled off the rare four-point play in the closing seconds — draining a corner 3 while being fouled and then hitting the ensuing free throw with 25.9 seconds remaining. The Bulldogs still held an 18-4 lead after one.

“The first two or three minutes dictates usually how that quarter is going to go,” Neal said. “That was our big thing — just come in, pedal to the metal and have a great start.”

That four-point play sparked an 11-0 Carey run. The Panthers clawed all the way back to within six at 19-13 on a jumper by Gabe Saili with 3:25 left in the first half — a stretch in which Rockland didn’t score a field goal for more than eight minutes.

“I got a little nervous,” Permann admitted. “But I knew we were going to be able to get out of that. We just didn’t want to repeat last year.”

He was right.

A corner 3 from junior Brayzen Gibbs put the lead back to double figures at 26-16 with 1:23 remaining, kickstarting an 11-3 run to close the half. The Bulldogs took a 30-16 lead into the break and never looked back. Rockland opened the third quarter on a 12-2 run and led by as many as 40 points before Neal cleared his bench late in the fourth.

“Once we stopped their run and got going again, it was just going our way,” Lowder said. “We play as a team — when one guy’s scoring, we’re all excited, and then another guy’s scoring, we’re all excited. We don’t get selfish.”

That was the case on defense as well.

From the 1:55 mark of the second quarter until Neal pulled his starters with five minutes remaining in the fourth — a stretch of nearly 13 minutes — Carey managed just seven points. The Panthers finished 11-of-40 from the field (27.5 percent), shot just 4-of-15 in the second half and committed 17 turnovers.

“It was 32 minutes of straight hard-nosed defense,” Neal said. “Make everything miserable, everything tough. I knew offensively we’d get the ball rolling eventually, but the defense was the constant.”

So was Lowder.

The senior guard scored 15 of his game-high 27 points in the first half, finishing 9-of-17 from the field with three 3-pointers and six made free throws.

“The kid’s just good,” Neal said. “He shoots from anywhere, he drives, he finishes well and defensively flies around and gets his hands up. He’s six feet tall and people ride him off all the time. You give him a little bit of space and he’s going to Steph Curry you.”

Now the Bulldogs will play in the third state championship game in program history.

They fell 55-36 to Carey in the 2015 title game before winning their first title in 2022 with a thrilling 53-51 victory over Camas County. None of this year’s players were on that team — the only remnant of that championship group is Neal and his coaching staff.

For Lowder, who was in eighth grade the last time Rockland played at the Ford Idaho Center, the moment carries special meaning.

“It feels great — it’s a childhood dream to get in there and play,” Lowder said. “But it’s only half the dream fulfilled right now. The rest of it is to get that blue trophy as a team, and I think our team has a really good shot.”