BOTHELL— Last Friday Everett Edwards had some tidying up to do.
The Lynnwood High School girls basketball coach had just finished practice and there was clutter spread throughout the Royals’ nearly brand-new gymnasium.
Edwards was up to the task, however. He has some experien
ce cleaning up.
Four years ago, Edwards inherited a program that hadn’t seen the state tournament since 1994, had little history of success and a roster full of inexperienced players.
But he saw a light at the end of the tunnel or maybe a sparkle underneath the dirt.
He soo
n learned that a strong trio of players would be coming to Lynnwood starting during his second season.
“When Mokun Fajemisin, Casey Evans and Meghan Cross came in as freshmen, they were players for me and that was the start of having kids that were experienced at basketball,” Edwards said. “Even though they were freshmen they have played a lot of AAU basketball.”
As recently as two years ago, the thought of Lynnwood being ahead of perennial power and cross-town rival Meadowdale, let alone ranked in the 3A state poll, was improbable.
“We’ve come a long way at Lynnwood when we are 13-3 and I’m a little disappointed,” Edwards said.
The Royals (8-2 Wesco 3A) currently are tied atop the league standings and are ranked ninth in the Tacoma News Tribune’s state poll. Last week they concluded a regular-season sweep of the Mavericks that included a road win at Meadowdale — a feat Edwards thinks may not have been matched since that 1994 state tournament team.
The on-court engine behind the turnaround has been the junior class of Fajemisin, Evans and Cross. They have changed expectations at a school that hasn’t had many athletic highlights in the past decade. According to Washington Interscholastic Activities Association records, Lynnwood has produced just two teams — in any sport — that have recorded a win in a state tournament in the past 10 years.
“It feels different,” Cross said. “Before we walked in expecting to lose. Now we go in expecting to win and the other team knows that. It’s a lot better to be on this end.”
A casual observer would just point to Fajemisin as the sole reason for the Royals’ success. After all she is the tallest player at 5-foot-11 and leads the team in scoring (15.8), rebounding (9.8) and blocks (2.5). But Fajemisin’s exceptional play doesn’t tell the whole story.
“The reason we are having success right now is we all get along with each other,” Edwards said. “The girls are all friends. We don’t really have any kind of drama.”
To say that the Lynnwood basketball program is one big family is not just a cliché. It’s the truth. Edwards’ daughter Jasmin, who is a freshman guard, leads the team in assists per game (2.1) and Grace Douglas, a reserve guard who scores 5.6 points per game, is the daughter of JV head/varsity assistant coach Dave Douglas.
Perhaps the best illustration of the heart of this team comes from guard Arsenia Ivanov, who is third on the team in scoring (8.9) and third in steals (1.8) per game. Ivanov, who goes by “AI” in part because of her initials, but also because she has a tough, gritty style like former NBA star Allen Iverson, tore her left anterior cruciate ligament before her freshman season when she was expected to contribute at the varsity level.
“I worked my butt off just to be able to play in state,” Ivanov said.
The one problem was that while she was rehabbing, the Royals accrued a losing regular-season record and state hopes were slim. But Edwards felt his team was close to breaking through after playing its best game of the season in a narrow loss at the end of the season to Edmonds-Woodway, which finished fifth at 4A state in 2010.
The Royals pulled off what was almost unthinkable then, upsetting Meadowdale and Glacier Peak to make the state playoffs.
Ivanov finally got to play in the state tournament, sinking some big 3-pointers.
“It was the greatest feeling,” she said.
The Royals dropped consecutive 9 a.m. contests at the Tacoma Dome, though they led in the fourth quarter of both games.
“I think that us making it to the state tournament last year was ahead of schedule,” said coach Edwards, whose roster this year has just one senior. “I hoped, but I felt that this (2011) would be our year.”
This may be the year of the Royals, but they may have to get by Shorecrest at district. The Scots (8-2, 9-7) have taken five of the past six games from Lynnwood, including sweeping two this season.
“We are definitely aware of it,” coach Edwards said. “We hope that we see them in the district tournament so that we can make amends.”
Even if it doesn’t end up to be Lynnwood’s year in 2011, the future is still bright. Next year the team returns all five starters (Fajemisin, Cross, Evans, Edwards, Ivanov) and most importantly, thanks to a lot of parent volunteers, Edwards has laid the groundwork for feeder programs that teaches his methods to kids as young as fifth grade.
“I feel like we’ve finally changed the culture at least for girls basketball,” Edwards said. “We have kids and parents excited and hopefully we can continue with that momentum.”
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