BELLEVUE — The No. 14 seed Edmonds-Woodway girls basketball team fell into a massive hole early and suffered a season-ending 63-41 loss to No. 11 seed West Seattle in a Class 3A state regional Saturday afternoon at Bellevue College.
West Seattle (20-4) capitalized on numerous Edmonds-Woodway turnovers while racing to a 17-2 first-quarter lead and extending the margin to 26-4 early in the second quarter. The Warriors (16-8) made just three field goals in the first half and trailed 31-11 at halftime.
“We couldn’t hit some shots early,” first-year E-W coach Jon Rasmussen said. “It was tough. We dug a hole, and that hole was almost impossible to get out of. … We couldn’t buy a basket in that first half.”
Edmonds-Woodway used a 20-11 third-quarter surge to trim the deficit to 42-31, but West Seattle countered with a 16-2 run to put the game out of reach and advance to next week’s Hardwood Classic in the Tacoma Dome.
“Give them kudos,” Rasmussen said. “They’re a great team and they can (do) some damage down there in Tacoma.”
West Seattle sophomore Jasmine Gayles scored a game-high 17 points. Edmonds-Woodway freshman Bailee Chynoweth had a team-high 12 points for a Warriors squad that started three underclassmen.
Edmonds-Woodway played the second half of the season without Long Beach State signee Missy Peterson, who suffered a foot injury in January.
“Losing Missy, that was just a killer for us,” Rasmussen said. “You can’t replace anyone like that.”
But the Warriors, who placed sixth in state last year, battled through the adversity to earn a second consecutive trip to regionals.
“Once Missy went down, no one thought we could do what we did,” Rasmussen said. “I give the credit to these girls. They never quit and they worked their tail off every day in practice, and good things happen when you work hard.”
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