Defense never rests in Academy playoff win

YAKIMA — A strong defensive effort once again carried the Moses Lake Christian Academy Lions but this time it really counted.

Behind a strong first half performance the Lions defense was enough to push them through the quarterfinals of the 1B State Basketball tournament with a 53-24 win over Troutlake/Glenwood yesterday.

Today the Lions will battle Lummi (22-2) in the quarterfinals starting with a 5:30 p.m. tip off at the Sundome.

Lummi advanced to play the Academy with their 65-34 win over King’s Way Christian.

In the first half the Lions’ offense got off on the right foot behind a solid 15-point performance to lead 15-8 after the game’s first eight minutes.

“It was good, I was happy for us to get some points to get rid of the nerves,” Lions coach Duke Wood said. “Our goal was to hit double digits in the first quarter. We knew they would throw a 2-3 zone and that left open the baseline. We had worked on that because we knew they were going to do it.”

However their season-long penchant for rough shooting patches reared its ugly head as the Lions struggled in the second quarter to find any kind of rhythm.

Still the Eagles were faced with more dire straights as the Academy defense kept them at bay and pitched a shutout to build their lead to 23-8 at halftime.

“I thought it was awesome that our defense could stop them because we couldn’t finish on offense,” Lions senior Stefan McNamara said. “It was good that we were holding them and that we far enough ahead of them to keep them from catching back up.”

McNamara noted his team can’t always rely on stifling defense to bail out a poor shooting game.

“It might work one more game but after that we’re going to have to start hitting our shots,” McNamara said. “We just need to finish our shots or we might not go far enough to get back to the championship game. We definitely need to start hitting those shots.”

The Lions shot a mere 21 percent from the field in the first half but held Troutlake/Glenwood to a paltry nine percent themselves — hitting only two total shots in game’s first 16 minutes.

“We never get overconfident because then coach will bring us down, especially since our offense isn’t that great,” Lions sophomore guard Joe Timofeyev said. “If we want to win games we have to play defense.”

Troutlake/Glenwood finally broke the ice at 5:55 in the third quarter and even doubled their point total but the Lions’ offense also got untracked and built their cushion to 42-16 going into the game’s final eight minutes.

“I told them at halftime we had to keep up the defensive pressure and good things would happen,” Wood said. “We got a bunch of rebound-andgoes, and when you struggle to score you try to get some easy layups and get some easy points.”

Jonny Roberts led the Lions with 20 points and 15 rebounds while Timofeyev had 10 points, five assists, and five rebounds.

McNamara added six points and five rebounds.

The Lions shot 44 percent in the second half and committed only 13 turnovers while forcing 23.

The Academy also outrebounded the Eagles 52-36.

Next is Lummi and 32 winning minutes from a second-straight semifinal appearance.

“Good thing is we got this one out of the way and that’s what we wanted,” Wood said. “Now we need to refocus. I have film on these guys. We’re going to go back to the hotel, talk some Xs and Os and figure out what we’re going to do.”