Shorecrest boys basketball gets revenge vs. Edmonds-Woodway
Published 11:15 pm Tuesday, January 28, 2025
EDMONDS – Eddie George paced in front of his bench. The Shorecrest boys’ basketball coach had only seen his team play four minutes against Edmonds-Woodway, and after a sequence of turnovers, he implored his team: “We need to wake up!”
After finishing the first quarter trailing 18-14, the Scots (17-2, 9-2) – led by hot-handed junior Brayden Fischer (21 points) – stormed back to a 74-52 win, handing the Warriors (17-1, 8-1) their first loss of the season and spoiling their senior night.
“This group is relentless,” George said. “They’re just a great bunch of kids. They just want to get better each and every day. So to be honest, and I don’t want this to sound arrogant or whatnot, but we expect to do things like this. When we’re on our game, and we’re locked in and focused, we’re capable of things like this.”
Final: Shorecrest wins 74-52
The Scots get revenge, not letting up in the 4th and handing Edmonds-Woodway its first loss of the season@HeraldNetSports
— Joe Pohoryles (@Joe_Poho) January 29, 2025
The two sides met just three weeks prior, with Edmonds-Woodway dealing Shorecrest its first loss of the season on home court, 53-48, in a battle between the top two teams in Wesco 2A/3A South. The Scots were short-handed in that matchup, with senior Junior Kagarabi (illness) and junior Alex Lo (ankle) neutralized with injuries.
At full strength and with revenge on their minds, the Scots overcame a slow start and slowly stretched their lead until it turned into a blowout. Fischer and senior Porter Swanson (18 points) each hit three 3-pointers. A healthy Kagarabi chipped in 12 points, including three crucial buckets down the stretch to keep Shorecrest ahead.
“Coming into the locker room, our energy was [there.] I knew it was going to be a different game in the second half,” Swanson said. “When he’s (George) telling us to wake up, we all know it. We all know we can play better than how we were, so then we just locked it in from there on out.”
Even before the break, Fischer pulled the Scots back into the game with three 3-pointers in the second quarter, the last putting Shorecrest ahead 36-35 in the final minute before halftime.
In the third, Shorecrest’s defense tightened up, and they turned the Warriors’ missed shots and turnovers into hard buckets at the other end. Swanson and senior Robel Biniam (six points) converted ‘and-1s’ on back-to-back possessions, and Kagarabi’s putback layup on a rare Fischer miss put the Scots ahead 47-38 just 2:19 into the second half.
“A lot of it was transition defense, we did a poor job of getting back,” Edmonds-Woodway coach Tyler Geving said. “Therefore we get caught, so now you’re in scramble mode a lot and they got wide-open shots.”
The Warriors were led by senior Cam Hiatt (16 points) and sophomore Grant Williams (14 points). The pair combined for 20 points in the first half, but their shots went cold in the later stages of the game.
With a 13-point lead entering the fourth quarter, Shorecrest picked up right where it left off. Biniam hit a 3-pointer on the first possession, and the Scots kept the Warriors out of reach down the stretch.
By the time each side cleared its bench to put the subs on the floor in the final minute, the visiting Shorecrest student section drowned out the rest of the gym chanting ‘I Believe That We Will Win.’ Swanson flexed and let out a yell. George – who just a couple hours prior went down his bench begging his team to wake up – took the same stroll, this time giving each of his players an emphatic high-five after putting the game to bed.
“It feels great, but it’s just another game,” Fischer said, despite the evident satisfaction displayed on the Scots bench. “We got a long, long road ahead, so this is just step one.”
