White River scraps, battles past Archbishop Murphy to secure first-round bye in 2A tournament
White River High School girls basketball coach Chris Gibson says the Hornets can pack up the bus and head to Yakima — they’re ready.
Saturday afternoon at Puyallup High School, fourth-ranked White River regrouped from an early deficit to pull away from fifth-ranked Archbishop Murphy, 49-41, in a Class 2A state regional game.
Both teams will advance to state tournament in the Yakima Valley SunDome next week for the third consecutive season, but the Hornets (24-3) earned a first-round bye with the win.
“That was our No. 1 thing we wanted to get,” White River senior Lee Audrey Norris said.
To get there, the Hornets had to contend with Archibshop Murphy bigs Julia Lucas (11 points, 13 rebounds) and Kiana Yesiki (13 points, eight rebounds).
“You can tell your kids all you want how physical it’s going to be,” Gibson said. “And you can’t experience it until you experience it.”
“We knew coming into this game they were going to be a force in the post,” Norris said. “We had to buckle down and decide to push them out of there anyway we can.”
The Wildcats built an early 7-0 lead, but White River trimmed it to a single possession by the end of the first quarter.
“I thought by the end of the first quarter we were convinced we could do it,” Gibson said. “They didn’t get down. They kept working, kept battling.”
Norris said adjustments on defense helped the Hornets claw back by the break. White River outscored the Wildcats, 21-9, in the second quarter to grab a 29-19 lead at the break, and never lost it.
“They came out really strong,” Norris said. “I think we had to buckle down our defense. That’s what we tried to focus on. It wasn’t really our offense that changed, it was just our defense.”
Archbishop Murphy was without standout senior Emily Rodabaugh, who suffered a season-ending shoulder surgery earlier in the season, and was sitting on the Wildcats’ bench in a cast.
Despite her absence, the Wildcats still managed to control the paint.
“We’re kind of slight of body,” Gibson said. “We have to be physical, not get rattled by people banging us around a little bit. We’re small. We got to scratch, we got to claw, we got to grab rebounds. That’s our thing.
“I thought we scrapped and battled and minimized the damage as much as we could. They’re tough inside.”
Kara Marecle scored a team-high 12 points for the Hornets, while Emma Robbins had 12 points and Norris added nine points and 10 rebounds.
Audrey Graham chipped in 10 points for the Wildcats.
Norris said playing Archbishop Murphy in the regional round gave the Hornets a good idea of the caliber of team’s they’ll face in Yakima.
“Just the physicality of this game is something we’re going to have to step up in our game,” she said. “We’re really excited to get in there and work hard.”
NO. 5 ARCHBISHOP MURPHY | 10 | 9 | 7 | 15 | — | 41 |
NO. 4 WHITE RIVER | 8 | 21 | 7 | 13 | — | 49 |
INDIVIDUAL SCORING
AM – Taylor Campbell 2, Alexa Chiangpradit 2, Chloe Jurdana 3, Julia Lucas 11, Kiana Yesiki 13, Audrey Graham 10.
WR – Chloe Narolski 9, Emma Robbins 12, Lee Audrey Norris 9, Kara Marecle 12, Taylor Schmidtke 5, Sam Fiedler 2.
This story was originally published February 23, 2019 at 5:12 PM.
