Maverick boys, girls prep for postseason

MOSES LAKE — Both the Moses Lake boys and girls basketball teams wrapped up their regular seasons on Saturday, and now quickly move into their respective Columbia Basin Big 9 tournaments.

The Maverick boys will travel to Sunnyside while the girls will host West Valley (Yakima). Both games will be played on Tuesday.

Moses Lake boys

The Mavs lost both of their regular-season matchups against Sunnyside; the first being a 62-59 loss in double overtime on the road on Dec. 17, then a 67-51 loss at home on Jan. 27 where the Mavericks held a three-point lead at the half.

“Since we know the teams so well we can really just focus on the matchups – especially their two players, (Brent) Maldonado and (Noah) McNair,” Moses Lake boys basketball Head Coach Jake Hunt said. “McNair really hurt us in the second half in Moses Lake, so it’s just focusing on executing our half-court defense. Teams at this point in the season are able to take away a lot of what you do in transition, so now you’ve just got to be able to play half-court basketball offensively and defensively.”

Hunt said that after a rough stretch in terms of injuries, Moses Lake enters the playoffs with a full, healthy roster.

“We had three posts go out in one week and had a couple of guard issues,” Hunt said. “We’ve got everyone back, and now hopefully you can just start clicking and moving forward. Build that chemistry and make a little run here in this week of basketball. It’s pretty straightforward – there’s no second chances, and you’ve got to win three in a row if you want to get into that second spot and into state.”

Having a full roster has helped on the practice court, with the team now able to hold five-on-five scrimmages against each other.

“It's definitely helped with the competitiveness in practice and how hard we’re able to get after things,” Hunt said.

Moses Lake tips off against the Grizzlies at 6 p.m. in Sunnyside.

“We’ve got to take care of the basketball, that’s our key for us,” Hunt said. “Our second key is you’ve got to rebound. Those have been our two biggest struggles this season, turnovers and rebounding. You take care of those two things, and you win a lot of basketball games.”

Moses Lake girls

Moses Lake closed out the regular season by winning three of five games, one of which was a two-point win over West Valley on Feb. 3.

Strophy described the switch in mentality from regular to the postseason as being “a lot more focused and serious,” with the marathon portion of the season being over. Now, the Mavs are in a sprint.

“Now we’re in sprint mode because everybody’s 0-0,” Strophy said. “For us, it’s win or go home. There’s a little more back-against-the-wall kind of concept and a little more dialed-in, focused-ness going on.”

Offensive focuses for the Maverick girls will be taking good shots and keeping control of the ball. Defensively, it’ll be about slowing down West Valley junior Laiken Hill.

“The biggest things we learned from the two previous contests is that we control how well we do,” Strophy said. “Sometimes the Rams will try and do things to us, but if we can maintain our focus and our control over what we do, then we’ve been fine. When we allow them to do things to us that we won’t like, that’s when bad things happen for us.”

Unlike the Moses Lake boys, the girls will play their game Tuesday night on their home floor.

“That’s a huge deal for us, it’s always comforting to play on our court in front of our fans,” Strophy said. “It’s something that we’ve been used to over the last number of years, so I think that sets the girls’ minds at ease, as it does myself, because we don’t have a two-hour bus ride. The home-court advantage for this game Tuesday night is a big one for us.”

With short turnarounds between games in the postseason, the Mavs will use experiences from past seasons to help smooth out the process.

“Our starting five, they all were players last year and they played in the Tacoma Dome,” Strophy said. “They know what it takes to get there.”

Along with making the “easy things,” like open shots and layups, Strophy said a key to the game will be communication.

“When we communicate with each other then we reduce our mistakes, and we’re so much more effective,” he said.

Ian Bivona may be reached at ibivona@columbiabasinherald.com.