BRUSH PRAIRIE — The streak is over. Or maybe it isn’t.
The Prairie girls basketball team came into Thursday with a streak of 219 consecutive league wins dating back to Jan. 31, 2000.
And with the Falcons playing in the 4A/3A Greater St. Helens League this season, Thursday’s 50-46 loss to Union could be considered the end of that streak. It was, after all, a league game.
But another way to look at it is that the streak should only include games against league foes from the same classification – the parameters by which each of those 219 games were won. So then, the streak continues.
That debate was hardly on the mind of senior Abbey Kaip in Union’s season-opener.
“All we were thinking about was we needed to focus on rebounding,” Kaip said. “We knew that they were a good team, and they hustled, pressed us the whole game. So we just needed to focus on rebounding and taking care of the ball.”
And a lot of taking care of the ball fell to Kaip, when two of Union’s top ballhandlers were out Thursday. Olivia Euverman was playing a club soccer match, and team leader Lolo Weatherspoon turned her ankle in practice two days ago.
“I texted Abbey last night and said ‘We’re going to need you to be the head of the snake tomorrow,’ ” Union coach Gary Mills said. “And she said ‘I’m ready for it.’ She hasn’t really been in that position before, but she put everybody on her shoulders. She rested for about a minute and a half that whole game. And with the tempo the way it was, that’s pretty impressive.”
Kaip led the Titans with 15 points, including four 3-pointers. Her last 3-pointer gave Union a 42-32 lead early in the fourth quarter.
Then Prairie senior Claire Heitschmidt, who had a game-high 23 points, put the Falcons on her shoulders. The Central Washington commit scored 13 of Prairie’s first 14 points in the fourth quarter before Hannah Clouse’s 3-pointer got Prairie within 48-46 with 2:10 left.
“Claire is a really good player, and I thought we did a good job on her in the first quarter and in the second quarter,” Mills said. “But in the third, we kind of got away from our principles, and she made some shots and got them right back in the game.
“And then I thought we did a good job on her in the last couple of minutes.”
When Union missed the front end of three 1-and-1s in the final two minutes, Heitschmidt got two looks at go-ahead 3-pointers but missed both. And then Kaneyl Carpenter forced Heitschmidt to take a tough shot in the key that was off the mark with 10 seconds to play.
“I think Kaneyl did a great job on Claire, and we just helped out and got the job done,” Kaip said.
Mariah Gahl buried two free throws with eight seconds left to seal the win.
And so ended the streak. Or maybe not.
It doesn’t really matter to Kaip. To her, it was just like the Titans’ win over the Falcons in a non-league game in 2019-20.
So let others debate the semantics.
“I just think a win’s a win,” the senior said. “And we got it done tonight.”
UNION 50, PRAIRIE 46
UNION – Kennedy Myers 3, Mariah Gahl 8, Grace Burchett 0, Sydney Cowling 5, Abbey Kaip 15, Kaneyl Carpenter 3, Caitlyn Leake 9, Ariel Ammentorp 7. Totals 16 (9) 9-15 50.
PRAIRIE – Kaitlyn Caughey 5, Lauren Sautter 0, Kori Clark 0, Claire Heitschmidt 23, Kylia Caesar 5, Sarah Neal 0, Jordan Peterson 0, Maddie Clouse 6, Taylor Judah 0, Hannah Clouse 7, Alysia Fraly 0. Totals 16 (8) 6-12 46.
Union 11 17 11 11—50
Prairie 6 10 13 17—46
JV—Union 34-27.
