ARLINGTON
It was a classic favorite versus underdog battle.
With the second seed to state from 3A District 1 on the line, the Meadowdale girls, who were vying for their 13th straight trip to the state tournament, faced off against the Shorecrest Scots, who had never been to state.
Before a full house at Arlington High School, it was senior Eryn Jones and Meadowdale that prevailed 62-39.
Jones, a first team all-conference guard, finished with a game-high 22 points helping ensure that she and her teammates would forge on after a six-point upset loss to Ferndale in the district championship game.
“We did not work this hard to come all this way to not make it to state and not reach our goal,” Jones said.
The Mavericks led nearly the entire game, shooting 56 percent from the field, making 27-of-48 shots. Shorecrest shot a miserable 16 percent in the first half and fell behind by 16. The Scots shot 25 percent for the game, making 13-of-51 shots
But led by their own first all-conference senior guard, Jocelyn Riordan, the Scots rallied in the third quarter and cut the lead to nine, 37-28 on a shot by Riordan with 1:47 left in the third quarter.
“It’s tough to beat a team three times in a row,” Jones said, referring to the Mavericks earlier 35- and 30-point wins over the Scots. “We knew they were going to bring it.”
But Meadowdale responded with an 8-0 run thanks to some unsung heroes. Sophomore guard Gabi Beyer drained a 3-pointer, junior center Anna Molitor knocked down a shot inside the paint and junior guard Breanna Carlow nailed another 3-pointer to put Meadowdale up 17 points with 25 seconds left in the quarter.
It proved to be the nail in the coffin for the Scots who never got any closer than 15 points the rest of the way.
“Even our subs coming off the bench, they stepped it up, everybody else stepped up. I love basketball. It was so fun tonight,” Jones said.
“Girls stepped up and had big assists. Carlow had some big threes,” Meadowdale coach Dan Taylor said.
Junior guard Hanna Fjortoft, the Mavs second-leading scorer behind Jones, sprained her left ankle in the Ferndale game and was on crutches. She is day-to-day, Taylor said.
Last year, the Mavericks advanced to the semifinals before losing to eventual champion Auburn-Riverside. They placed sixth.
Besides Molitor, the starting center who stands 6-feet, the Mavericks are a relatively short team that isn’t as deep talent-wise as some past teams. Ferndale’s ability to rebound and get second-chance points helped it beat Meadowdale in the district title game.
“It will be tougher,” Taylor acknowledged. “We always try to stay optimistic for the girls. The depth comes from the our heart. I believe in each and every one of our girls.”
Shorecrest ended its season 16-10, one win short of its first trip to state.
“I thought we got some pretty good open looks, we had a couple breakdowns, it wasn’t our night,” Shorecrest coach Jon Rasmussen said.
Still, he was proud of his team and what they accomplished especially after being picked to finish seventh in the Western Conference South Division at the start of the season.
“This team was the biggest overachiever, they battled, they’re awesome,” he said. “To be one game away from state is pretty much unbelievable.”
Riordan said the Scots would have had to have “played a near perfect game to beat Meadowdale.”
“We gave it our all, but we made a few mistakes and that’s what cost us,” she said, adding that she wrote on the board, “‘Don’t cry because it’s over, smile because it happened.”
If Riordan is accepted to the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma in the next few weeks, she plans to play basketball for the Logger women next year.
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