AUBURN — The Prairie Falcons opted to go without hotel reservations Friday night.
No use for a sleep-over — as long as they accomplished what they set out to do in the opening round of the Class 3A girls basketball state tournament.
“I didn’t even bring my phone charger,” sophomore Cori Woodward said. “That’s how confident I was because I bring that thing everywhere.”
“I didn’t bring my toothbrush,” added sophomore Megan Lindsley.
Woodward, Lindsley, and the rest of the Falcons did not embarrass themselves with no place to stay, with none of life’s little necessities. They shook off a slow start and pulled away to beat Lakeside of Seattle 58-37 at Auburn Mountainview High School.
The win sends the Falcons to the Elite Eight, to be played in the Tacoma Dome beginning Thursday.
Lakeside will face Wilson of Tacoma today for another berth to the Dome.
The Falcons did not even entertain the idea that they might have to play the Saturday game.
“We didn’t want to question ourselves,” senior Lauren Goecke said. “Come out and play our game. Don’t doubt ourselves. You’re not playing not to lose, you’re playing to win.”
Lindsley connected on three of her team’s nine 3-pointers and scored 13 points, leading four Falcons in double figures. Woodward, Goecke, and Jackie Lanz each scored 10 points.
The Falcons shot 33 percent from the floor in the first half and endured a five-minute stretch of the second quarter without scoring. Yet, they maintained the lead thanks to their defensive pressure.
“It’s always good, knowing we can still control our defense,” Goecke said of weathering the shooting slump. “We did the little things we could control.”
Goecke beat the half-court horn with a 3-pointer to give Prairie a 20-14 lead, the first points for the Falcons since the 5:23 mark of the quarter.
Lindsley said the team regrouped at halftime.
“All of us needed to come together, we needed to focus,” she said. “We knew where we wanted to go — Tacoma. I’m so excited for next week, oh my gosh.”
Prairie’s quarterfinal game will be at 10:30 a.m. Thursday against the winner of Timberline vs. Kennedy.
To get there, though, the Falcons had to hold off one final push from Lakeside.
The Falcons had six turnovers in the third quarter, and Lakeside took advantage, pulling to within three points at 27-24.
Woodward, though, would make a free throw then swished a 3-pointer in the final minute of the period to give the Falcons a seven-point advantage. It turned out to be the beginning of an 18-2 run to put the game out of reach. Woodward, yet another player asked to do a little more with the absence of the injured Heather Corral, scored all of her points in the second half.
“It’s a really great feeling to show up for Heather,” Woodward said. “I just knew what I had to do. And we want to go as far as we can for Heather.”
“We’re excited to be there,” Prairie coach Al Aldridge said of the upcoming trip to the Dome. “They believe in themselves and they’ve persevered through some adversity. They’ve got to feel like we’re a team of destiny right now.”
The Falcons also got the job done on the boards. A small, but quick team, the Falcons outrebounded Lakeside by nine in the second half. Four players had at least five rebounds, led by Adams and Woodward with seven apiece.
Angela Gelhar’s 3-pointer with 5:30 left in the game gave Prairie a 13-point lead, and it was the third shot of the possession. Lanae Adams and Woodward each had offensive rebounds to keep the scoring opportunity alive.
The next trip down the court, Goecke grabbed an offensive board and found Lindsley, who hit her third 3-pointer of the game to push the advantage to 16. The Falcons then slammed the door on the Lions by making their final 10 free throws.
From there, it was time to get back home, to plug in their phones, to brush their teeth, to get a good night’s sleep in their own beds.
Just like they planned all along.
