Lake Stevens basketball hosts Australian cultural exchange

LAKE STEVENS — It’s not every day that opposing high school basketball teams hang out together at Chick-fil-A after a game, or that half the visiting team spends the night lodging in the opposing coach’s living room.

But this was not like any other high school basketball matchup.

Coming all the way from Mount Gambier in South Australia, the Tenison Woods Titans faced Lake Stevens in a girls and boys basketball double-header — or a quadruple-header if you count the junior varsity squads — on Tuesday.

Just one stop in Tenison Woods’ biennial Titans USA Tour, Lake Stevens defeated the visiting side in both varsity games, with the girls claiming a 62-32 victory before the boys won 78-38. But the final scores will be just a footnote in the grand scheme of things.

For the Catholic K-12 school of roughly 1,400 students, from a rural town of about 28,000 people, the main goal of the tour is to connect with local schools and learn about each other’s cultures, with basketball serving as the vehicle.

“Our system’s a bit different in Australia, where school basketball is not a priority,” said Matt Sutton, the head coach of both the Titans’ girls and boys teams. “So we’re grateful our kids get the opportunity to play at such a high level and the games were treated with the utmost respect, which is really good.

“And then as a community, (the people of Lake Stevens) have been so welcoming, warm and friendly, and (it’s) a time we won’t forget.”

Starting in Vancouver, B.C. just a few days ago, Tenison Woods is making its way down the West Coast over the course of 23 days, with stops in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco and Los Angeles before returning to Australia by way of Hawaii. Aside from playing basketball teams across the region along the way, the students will attend NBA games, NFL games and go to Disneyland, and partake in plenty of lower-scale activities in between.

Lake Stevens became a stop on the tour after Tenison Woods posted on the WIAA website looking for games in this region on Tuesday, and while it meant the girls team would end up playing three days in a row, the Vikings made it work, according to boys coach Alex Iverson.

After getting accustomed to the cold weather in Snohomish County this time of year — it reached a high of 82 degrees Fahrenheit in Mount Gambier on Tuesday, albeit during summer down there — the Titans went shopping at the Seattle Premium Outlets in Tulalip.

Upon arriving at Lake Stevens High School, the Titans explored the athletic facilities, which included an up-close view of the football team practicing ahead of the 4A State Championship this weekend. For most, if not all of the Australian athletes, it was their first time seeing American football in action.

But then it was time for the basketball action.

After a slow start, the Vikings girls jumped out to an 18-10 lead in the first quarter, with junior Noelani Tupua scoring 14 of them. Then her sister, senior Keira Isabelle Tupua, started to get hot. After scoring zero points in the first quarter, the elder Tupua hit three 3-pointers in the second quarter alone as the Vikings cruised into half leading 40-22.

“I was just kind of pissed on defense,” Noelani Tupua said about the start of the game. “We weren’t really marking our players. It was just messy all around. But I think it was due to the fact that we played yesterday (a 51-46 win against Meadowdale). But I think it will help us in the long run for when we go to state — Hopefully, we go to state.”

After clamping down defensively and getting into a better offensive rhythm, Lake Stevens allowed just 10 points in the second half en route to a 62-32 win. Noelani (21 points, six rebounds, five steals) and Keira Isabelle (20 points, 11 rebounds) combined for 41 points in the decisive victory.

Macca Burke (14 points, five rebounds) led the way for the Titans, delivering a highlight-reel play midway through the second quarter with a shifty move around a Vikings defender and drawing the ‘And-1’ with an underhand layup, cutting the score to 25-19 after the free throw. As much skill as Burke displayed, she gushed about Lake Stevens’ quality of play, praising their ball-handling and Keira Isabelle Tupua’s shot in particular.

“It’s just amazing to experience the level of difficulty those girls are playing at,” Burke said. “It’s like nothing we’ve seen in Australia, so it’s just really cool to see what the other side of the world brings.”

After exposing themselves to every aspect of American high school basketball, including the pregame run onto the court for warmups and the giant American flag the Vikings lower down for the national anthem, Tenison Woods gave back a little piece of Australian culture after the game.

In the postgame handshake line, each Lake Stevens player was handed a goodie bag, which contained a squishy kangaroo toy wearing a Tenison Woods shirt, as well as an assortment of Minties, Vegemite, Tim Tams, Chupa Chups, and Cadbury Koalas, among other Australian snacks.

“I think it’s super cool to get the chance to go talk to all these kids,” Lake Stevens girls coach Seth Dodge said. “Even when they’re going off playing their select basketball or soccer, like people from all over the country and world, and I think it’s super cool that they get that experience to hear what it’s like to be from Australia.”

Shortly after the exchange and an on-court photo, the two teams meshed together in the stands, talking to each other as the boys game ramped into gear.

After having a similarly slow start like the girls team, the Vikings boys quickly strung together a 6-0 run, with junior Devin Freeman opening the scoring with a shot under the basket before nabbing a steal and setting up junior Yeki Bekele for a clean layup. On the ensuing Titans possession, Lake Stevens senior Gabe Allinson stole the ball and took it all the way to the hoop for another bucket.

The Vikings took a 23-10 lead at the end of the first quarter and never looked back. Freeman (five rebounds, five steals) finished with a game-high 21 points, while Bekele (15 points, four rebounds) and Allinson (12 points, five rebounds, two steals) each reached double-figures.

For Tenison Woods, Angus Heesemans led the scoring with nine points, while Charlie Williams (six points, five rebounds) and Oliver Braun (two points, five rebounds, two blocks) made their presence known on the boards.

“It was pretty intense to start off the game,” Braun said. “They played a really good team game. You could tell they’ve been playing together a fair bit, whereas our team probably hasn’t as much, but yeah, it felt like the game felt really close, but the scoreboard just didn’t reflect that.”

For Lake Stevens, it was all about respecting the opponent. Along with never letting off the gas and giving full effort through the final whistle, the Vikings players were often first to offer a hand to help a Titans player off the floor if he got knocked down.

The sportsmanship carried over in the handshake line, where the Vikings boys received the same goodie bags, and where Sutton handed out a beanie to acknowledge a player he felt “played hard, played the right way and had a really positive impact on the game.” Sutton joked he didn’t have enough to give out to all the players who met those qualifications, but it ultimately went to Keira Isabelle Tupua for the girls team and Freeman for the boys.

“They were all nice,” Freeman said of the Titans. “It was fun. Like it was cool to see people from a different country and play basketball.”

As the Lake Stevens girls divided up into cars to head to Chick-fil-a with the Tenison Woods girls, Iverson finalized carpools and sleeping arrangements for the Titans boys. While Sutton and the other Tenison Woods coaches would stay at a nearby hotel, Iverson himself would end up hosting six players at his house for the night before they embarked on their next part of the tour.

“I’m going to make sure that they got some food,” Iverson said. “They can shower, and then I’m going to trust that my downstairs will look the same in the morning. … But no, they’re nothing but nice and respectful. They play hard and tough.”

While the Australian kids are looking forward to visiting Los Angeles and Hawaii at the tail end of the trip, the Lake Stevens Vikings hope the program returns again in 2027.