Lynnwood gets long-awaited win at Meadowdale

Published 11:39 pm Friday, December 17, 2010

LYNNWOOD — No 3A girls basketball teams go into Meadowdale’s gym and push around the Mavericks.

Lynnwood was reminded of that fact Friday night, but still managed to escape with the 62-58 Wesco 3A victory.

The margin didn’t matter to the Royals, who according to coach Everett Edwards hadn’t won here in some 15 years.

“We really wanted to win this,” junior Meghan Cross said. “We wanted to prove that we are the better team in Lynnwood.”

Cross led the Royals with 18 points.

Despite a 12-point advantage with four minutes to go in the game, the Royals almost didn’t escape “The Stable” unscathed.

High-speed guard Margreet Barhoum and the Mavs scratched and clawed back to make it a two-possession game with a minute to go but a few free throws sealed the win.

Despite being the focus of the Lynnwood defense all night, Barhoum led all scorers with 20 points.

During two late timeouts down the stretch, Edwards urged his team to be smart and keep cool heads. A year ago with the core of the lineup freshmen and sophomores, the Royals may have wilted. They made state thanks to a surprise playoff run, but struggled for much of the regular season. This team is more mature now.

“It’s a good learning lesson for our girls,” Edwards said. “I’m happy. We won the game, so I’m happy.”

Coming into the game, The Royals (2-1 league, 6-1 overall) were likely the favorites on paper, having achieved their first state ranking (No. 9) in years this week after starting the season 5-0, but a loss to Shorecrest and Meadowdale’s (2-1, 3-4) victory over Glacier Peak this week meant that the Mavs, who had only lost to 4A teams before Friday, were ahead in the early Wesco 3A standings.

“We knew we could do it and we needed this after our loss to Shorecrest to show that we are as good people think we are,” Cross said. “We don’t want to disappoint people. We want to show how good we are because we know we can do it.”

Both teams used a full-court press at times, which led to a fast pace. It also led to a lot of turnovers on both sides. The Royals seemed to handle the pressure a bit better in part due to their height advantage. Cross and Mokun Fajemisin got their hands into passing lanes for steals on defense and were able to reach high to protect the ball on offense.

Both players are within 2 inches of 6 feet tall and the Mavs roster includes just one regular 5-foot-10 or taller.

Fajemisin was almost impossible to stop, racking up 17 points. The only thing that seemed to slow her down were the referees, who whistled her for several traveling violations on the night.

“Mokun is just a hard matchup,” Meadowdale coach Troy Parker said.

“We are going to be challenged when teams bring height at us and we allow that height to play into the game.”

Meadowdale kept itself in the game in the first half with shots from long range. After the Mavs fell behind by seven early in the second quarter, Julianne Kossian came off the bench and hit back-to-back treys for her first points of the game to trim the lead to 21-18. Kossian finished with 12 points— just two less than Bianca Landa who was second on the Mavs in scoring.

Lynnwood had its biggest outburst at the start of the third quarter when the Royals reeled off four straight baskets to go up 40-28.

“The key to the game was they got off to fast starts in both halves,” Parker said. “So we are battling from behind both halves. I thought we battled really hard. They made just enough plays to stay ahead.”

Parker believes there are a lot of good teams in Wesco 3A and its likely that the title we be decided on the last day of league play.

“Teams in this league are going to slug it out… It’s going to come down to a night in February and you are going to have to beat somebody good to get where you want to go,” Parker said.

For the Royals, the place they want to go is the state playoffs.

“We want to do better than we did last year,” Cross said. “We have the ability to get to state and we know that. Last year we didn’t think we could. This year we know we can and we don’t want to just get there.”

At Meadowdale H.S.

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Meadowdale10181119—58

Lynnwood—Edwards 5, Maza3, Douglas 4, Cross 18, Evans 1, Fajemisin 17, Ivanov 8, Parker 0, Wilson 6. Meadowdale—Fjortoft 0, Barhoum 20, Landa 14, Rickel 0, Reuble 0, O’Neil 7, Kossian 12, Bretz 5, Sagdahl 0, Sonko 0. 3-Point Goals— Kossian 2, Barhoum 2, Cross 2, Ivanov 1, Maza 1, Landa 1. Records—Lynnwood 2-1 league, 6-1 overall. Meadowdale 2-1, 3-4.