EDMONDS — The Arlington Eagles shook off a sluggish start in Wednesday’s game against Edmonds-Woodway to prove why they earned the No. 3 ranking in the state’s first 3A Associated Press girls basketball poll of the season, which was released earlier in the day.
The Eagles fell behind 6-0 early, but answered with a 12-0 run and never trailed again in a 58-44 victory over the Warriors.
“That happens sometimes,” Arlington head coach Joe Marsh said of the slow start. “I wasn’t really worried about it. It’s early in the game. We came right back and got a couple of buckets and then it’s a ball game. … They came out quick and they hit some shots. The reality is, that’s going to happen to you sometimes.”
The Eagles scored their first points of the game on a 3-pointer by senior Serafina Balderas with 4 minutes, 55 seconds remaining in the first quarter. Less than a minute later, Arlington took the lead for good.
Balderas was the spark for the Eagles on both ends of the floor throughout the contest. She finished with a game-high 16 points and had several steals on defense that led to easy points for Arlington.
“She’s just fearless,” Marsh said of Balderas. “She’s a warrior. She comes out every night. She hits that three and you know when she hits one early I’m like ‘OK, here we go. Let’s see what happens.’ She’s not afraid to shoot it and she plays great defense and she just has a great attitude. She’s kind of representative of what we do. She’s all over the floor. She’s the smallest kid on the floor and she’s been that way her whole life, but she doesn’t care. She just goes out and fights. She had a great game tonight and just really sparked are energy.”
Balderas is listed on the roster as exactly 5-feet tall, which is at least three inches shorter than any other player on the Arlington or the Edmonds-Woodway roster. Balderas and her teammates have embraced the defense-first philosophy Marsh has instilled over the past several seasons.
“We have a lot of short people on our team, so we try to use it to our advantage,” Balderas said. “We just try to get up in people and make them uncomfortable. Once we get those steals we’re looking down the court and getting those into offensive points for us.”
The Warriors had scored 60 or more in five of their first 10 games and hadn’t scored less than 48 so far this season until the Eagles held them to 44 on Wednesday.
“If I can hold that team with all of those weapons to 44 points, we’re really happy with that,” Marsh said. “We had great effort. We’ve had great effort from kids all year. Kids are coming off the bench and playing the same kind of defense (as the starters), it’s been nice. It was a good one tonight.”
The Eagles led 29-17 at the half, but used a 23-10 run to open the fourth quarter to put the game away.
“In the locker room we said the first four minutes of the (second) half were really important,” Marsh said. “Last year, in two games, we were up 10 on them coming out of halftime and they came right back at us and we didn’t want that to happen this year, so were really put an emphasis on playing great defense and getting some stops early and we did that. We got some stops and buckets and we stretched it out.”
Marsh didn’t know his team had earned the No. 3 ranking in the state until after the game, but didn’t seemed overly concerned with what it means at this point of the season.
“That stuff is fun,” he said. “It’s fun and it’s fun for the kids, but obviously we don’t worry about that stuff. We’re just trying to play. We’ve been really consistent this year. We’ve got nine seniors and they’re really mature and they’ve been through it all. We’re just trying to keep playing basketball so that we get better and better and we’re ready for a really tough district tournament.”
The Warriors have little time to rest after Wednesday’s loss. They play the defending state champion and No. 2 ranked Lynnwood on Friday.
“You know these are very good teams,” Edmonds-Woodway head coach Rebekah Wells said. “Last year (Arlington) got fourth in state and Lynnwood got first. You know it’s a very tough conference, so the girls have to be ready to come out and play because to be able to get further on in playoffs and to go to regionals and all those other things you have to be able to beat these teams.”
At Edmonds-Woodway H.S.
Arlington 12 17 23 6 —58
Edmonds-Woodway 8 9 13 14 —44
Arlington — Gracie Castaneda 12, Serafina Balderas 16, Sarah Shortt 5, Sevi Bielser 6, Peyton Brown 6, Selena Gutierrez 0, Olivia Larson 2, Emma Janousek 7, Emmi Modahl 0, Abby Anderson 0, Jayla Russ 4. Edmonds-Woodway — Isabel Callen 2, Ally Burdett 0, Mady Burdett 5, Marivel Ortega 6, Ingred Fusberg 0, Maddie Tudor 7, Adrienne Poling 7, Emma Dickenson 0, Ellie Schull 2, Courtney Simpson 3, Missy Peterson 12. Records — Arlington 10-0. Edmonds-Woodway 8-3.
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