Card girls off to state tourney after Lakeside win

See a photo gallery from the event here.

The Medical Lake girls earned a tense 32-30 victory over the Lakeside Eagles Tuesday night at West Valley High School in the District 7 championship game and qualified for the 1A state tournament for the first time since 1991.

With Jaycee Oliver scoring 10 points, the Cardinals broke a 17-17 halftime tie and led 27-24 after the third quarter.

Winners of 18 consecutive games, Medical Lake now advances to the round of 16 on either Feb. 24 or 25 at a site to be determined. A complete story on the game will appear in the Feb. 23 edition of the Cheney Free Press.

Medical Lake got to the district championship with a 39-30 win over Deer Park Feb. 10 as freshman Jayda Noble scored 13 points.

The Stags attempted, and succeeded to a point in taking away an element of Medical Lake's game that has propelled them all season

"They played very well and did a good job keeping us from shooting uncontested shots, " head coach Kyle Lundberg said of Deer Park. "We had a hard time getting it going. It was a slow-paced game."

His team is now 19-2 and ranked No. 11 in the state RPI rankings, earning Lundberg Coach of the Year honors in the Northeast A League. Noble and Makayla Geiger were both first team All-Northeast A League selections, while Lexi Redell was a second-team selection.

Deer Park (10-12), hopes to also advance to regionals versus the Caribou Trail League later this week, but face Chewelah, which tied Lakeside for second in the regular season and is now 15-7 prior to a Feb. 14 loser-out game.

They hung with Medical Lake most of the way, but a couple of lapses, fueled by a rash of turnovers, changed the outcome.

After trailing just 19-15 at halftime, the Stags ran off five straight points to open the third quarter, and led 20-19. But Medical Lake answered and closed the quarter with a 7-4 scoring edge and led 26-21 going into the fourth.

Medical Lake's pressure defense forced a series of Chewelah turnovers in the quarter. "We really struggled with our shooting," Lundberg said. "But we were able to rely on our defense to get us going," he added.

That offensive burst in the last part of the third quarter continued into the final period where Medical Lake opened with an 8-2 run that pushed their lead back to double-digits at 34-23. "We finally got a few easy shots caused by turnovers," Lundberg said of a sure turning point in what had been a see-saw contest.

While Noble was the only Cardinal in double-figures, Geiger and Jaycee Oliver each added seven points in the win.

Typical of the low-scoring affair, in one particular span of about 90 seconds in the fourth quarter, starting at the 5-minute mark, Medical Lake controlled the offensive rebounds and had had three consecutive possessions. The only downside might have been their coming away without a point.

"We were thinking if we can get offensive rebounds and melt the clock we would be good," Lundberg explained. "Points would have been nice but luckily our defense won the game for us."

How the team advances in the postseason hangs somewhat on a Feb. 14 home game against Lakeside (14-7). A win sends them directly to the state 1A round of 16.

Losing to the Eagles, whom they defeated twice previously - 48-36 at home and 50-47 on the road - means a Friday, Feb. 17 game at home versus the Caribou Trail's No. 2 seed. That would be a loser-out matchup.

For a team that has had its share of big games this season, Lundberg categorized Tuesday as, "(The) biggest game of the year. Hopefully we can have an outstanding shooting performance along with a good defensive outing."

Medical Lake's postseason history is somewhat short and all centered around a run beginning 30 years ago with a team that made its first appearance under head coach Val Bunce, later known by her married name of Val Von Lehe. That 1986-87 team went 1-2 and did not place. The 1988-89 team went 0-2 at state, but the 1990-91 Cardinals placed fourth.

Paul Delaney can be reached at [email protected].

See a photo gallery from the event here.