SNOHOMISH — While their conference rival was in the Tacoma Dome winning the 3A state championship last March, Brian Hill and the Glacier Peak Grizzlies basketball team couldn’t bring themselves to head to the dome to watch.
After a strong campaign that saw Glacier Peak, the No. 2 team out of District 1, reach the regional round of the state tournament with a 20-3 record, the Grizzlies were rewarded with a matchup against two-time defending state champion Cleveland. Glacier Peak took an early lead before eventually losing, 62-52.
The loss stuck with Hill, who didn’t make his usual trip to the Tacoma Dome to watch the state tournament, where Cleveland lost to Glacier Peak’s Wesco 3A South rival Lynnwood in the state title game.
“It took a long time to recover from losing to Cleveland,” Hill said. “I couldn’t go down to state like I usually do. I thought we should be there.”
Glacier Peak has made it to the regionals the past five seasons and advanced to the the Tacoma Dome twice. But the 2015 game against Cleveland really hurt.
“I don’t know that I’ll ever get over that game,” Hill said. “We had a really great team and a really great group of girls. They loved each other, they played hard for each other. It wasn’t about any one particular person. It was about a team effort. Always. That’s what we’ve got to try to get back to this year. I thought we were a championship team. We know what it takes to be at that level and it’s my job to get us back there.”
The Grizzlies return all but two players from last year’s squad: Sadie Mensing and Kianna Garner. The pair were key to last year’s success for Glacier Peak but several returners — including senior Natalie Rasmussen and juniors Samantha Fatkin, Paisley Johnson and Kayla Watkins — have high hopes for this season.
“We’re just picking up where we left off last year,” Rasmussen said. “We have a little chip on our shoulder. We’ve been waiting for (the season to start) all year, ever since the season ended last year. We’ve been counting down the days until we get another shot.”
Added Fatkin: “It was a really hard game to get over. But I think it’s a good experience and we’re not going to let it happen again.”
The Glacier Peak players say they’ve noticed a change in Hill this season. There’s a greater sense of urgency from the head Grizzly.
“I definitely see a difference with how he’s acted just in these past couple of days, with how focused he is in practice,” Johnson said. “Last year, he was focused but it was more relaxed. But now, it’s not like we have a lot on the line but he’s like, ‘It’s time.’”
Hill admits he expects a lot from this team.
“I tell them all the time, ‘I’m the hardest person to please,’ because if you’re playing offense and you score, than I’ll be yelling at the defense,” Hill said with a laugh. “If you’re on offense and you don’t score, I’ll be yelling at the offense because the defense is doing a great job. I’m never happy. There’s always something to fix.”
The early-season practices have Glacier Peak working hard, but the Grizzlies don’t mind.
“I think from that game, practice is harder now,” Watkins said. “We’re pushing harder in practice now. We’re coming back, not as a new team, but as one that works harder. Our practices right now are really intense.”
“We hold a high standard for everybody on the team,” Johnson said. “Everybody should be working hard. Every practice has to be good.”
Hill is looking to Rasmussen, one of four seniors on the roster, as well as Fatkin, Johnson and Watkins — a 6-foot-1 post — to lead the Grizzlies this season.
“Looking at the nucleus of what Glacier Peak has, they have a very good group of kids,” Lynnwood coach Everett Edwards said. “And they’re still young. They have Rasmussen, who’s a senior. They have a good group of juniors with Samantha Fatkin, Paisley Johnson and Kayla Watkins. They are a very competitive group of kids who are very well-coached. I can say that they are our toughest rival at this point in Wesco.”
Getting to the state quarterfinals at the Tacoma Dome won’t be easy for the Grizzlies. In fact, regionals is not a guarantee. Glacier Peak plays in the same conference as Lynnwood, and in a district tournament that features several strong 3A teams, including Arlington, Edmonds-Woodway, Shorewood, Stanwood and Ferndale.
“We have a great league,” Hill said. “All of these teams push us and hopefully we’ll push them. Our league is tough. Just to make it to regionals again is a big accomplishment.”
However, reaching the regionals is not the Grizzlies’ goal.
“We’ve been to regionals five times in a row and we’ve been to Tacoma twice. For as good as our teams have been we don’t have a lot to show for it,” Hill said. “We’ve got two district titles and a couple league titles and that’s really about it. I would love to put a glass trophy in the case. A state trophy of some sort would be great.
“The ultimate goal is to get something that the girls can come back 20 years later and say, ‘Hey! I helped put that in there.’”
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