3A girls state semifinals: Sophia Liesse scores 22 as Lake Washington stuns top-seeded Eastside Catholic

TJ COTTERILL TACOMA — Two years ago, Sophia Liesse was leading a Lake Washington High School girls basketball team that would finish the season 2-18. She

TJ COTTERILL

TACOMA — Two years ago, Sophia Liesse was leading a Lake Washington High School girls basketball team that would finish the season 2-18.

She couldn’t have dreamed then that her junior year would
end in the 3A state championship game, lifting the Kangaroos over what had been
the most dominant basketball team in the state.

Liesse hit four 3-pointers, scored a game-high 22 points and Lake Washington was jumping, shouting and ecstatic in celebrating their 62-49 victory over top-ranked Eastside Catholic in the 3A state semifinals on Friday in the Tacoma Dome, sending the Kangaroos to their first state-championship game since 1999.

• PHOTO GALLERY

Eastside Catholic (28-2) hadn’t lost to an in-state opponent
this season before Lake Washington (22-6).

“It’s crazy,” Liesse said. “It’s such a rush. It’s exciting to be here. We earned it.”

As coach Jeff Wilson would so aptly say afterward, this Lake
Washington squad filled with freshmen, sophomore and juniors never looked panicked.
Not in playing their first ever game in the Tacoma Dome on Wednesday – the program’s
first trip here since 2014 – and not Thursday against UW-bound Jayda Noble and
Mt. Spokane, and certainly not Friday against Eastside Catholic, which had only
previously lost to Windward of Los Angeles, California, in the Nike Tournament
of Champions earlier this season.

“Even when other teams have made their runs, we’ve never
looked panicked these past three games,” Wilson said. “Just their composure has
been awesome.”

It was 42-40 late in the third quarter when Eastside
Catholic’s Zaza Walton scored underneath the basket and Lake Washington’s
6-foot-4 sophomore post Elise Hani was on the bench with four fouls. But Lake
Washington responded with 16-2 run into the fourth quarter, with Liesse
starting the fourth quarter with a 3-pointer.

“I think we all just work so well together,” Liesse said. “And
we have the chemistry and that shows on the court.”

WHAT MADE THE
DIFFERENCE

Lake Washington has shown it can compete with a track meet
with any team. It certainly wasn’t scared off by Eastside Catholic’s core of
talented freshmen and their penchant for beating teams up the court.

Rosa Smith added 13 points for the Kangaroos, who held
Eastside Catholic to 18-for-63 shooting (28.6 percent). And even with Hani
spending most of the game on the bench in foul trouble, her younger sister,
freshman Sydney Hani, helped Lake Washington outrebound EC, 41-37.

TURNING POINT

Liesse’s 3-pointer with 5:37 to play gave Lake Washington a
49-42 lead and she followed with another bucket to make it 51-42 and you could
feel Eastside Catholic’s state-title hopes slipping away. She followed the next
possession with an assist to Elise Hani and suddenly the Kangs went from up
42-40, to up 53-42 with 4:34 left.

PLAYERS OF THE GAME

Sophia Liesse, Lake Washington

She scored 10 of her game-high 22 points in the first
quarter and was fairly quiet after that before putting Eastside Catholic away
in the final period. She also had four rebounds, two assists and did all of
that on 8-for-11 shooting (4-for-5 from the 3-point line).

Zaza Walton, Eastside Catholic

Walton had another double-double for the Crusaders, with the
sophomore post scoring 21 points with 10 rebounds and three steals. But the
Crusaders struggled from the floor, making 18 of 63 shots (28.6 percent ) for
the game.

UP NEXT

Lake Washington will try to win the program’s first state girls basketball championship when it plays in that game for the first time since 1999 at 9 p.m. Saturday at the Tacoma Dome. 

Follow TJ Cotterill on Twitter @TJCotterill.