Trailing by 14 in the fourth quarter, Fife needed an improbable rally. Here’s how the they did it

Mark Schelbert’s head was spinning.

The longtime Fife High School boys basketball coach witnessed one of the program’s best fourth-quarter comebacks in a long time.

And it meant something special — Schelbert’s group was returning to the Class 2A tournament in Yakima.

Trailing by 14 with less than eight minutes to go, Fife rallied for an improbable 51-45 victory over Olympic in a state regionals loser-out game Saturday afternoon at Puyallup High School.

Fife (20-7) will play 2A SPSL rival Franklin Pierce in the opening round Wednesday at the Yakima Valley SunDome.

It will be back-to-back trips for Fife, which graduated six seniors off last season’s group, including five who were vital cogs in the rotation.

What Fife did not lose was its defensive intensity, which triggered the wild fourth-quarter comeback.

Olympic took a 43-29 lead on Brandon Barron’s two free throws with 7:37 remaining.

But Fife held Olympic without a made field goal the entire quarter (0-for-12), and forced four turnovers.

Malachi Afework’s steal and layup gave Fife the boost it needed, cutting Olympic’s lead to 43-39 with 3:56 to go.

“That is kind of how we’ve payed all year, relying on our defense,” Afework said. “We are used to grinding it out. We are a hard-working team.”

But as Schelbert put it, “We needed juice … getting stop after stop works for a while, but you’ve got to have a reward at the end.”

Finally, after three miserable quarters of shooting, Fife started making perimeter shots. Bryson Williams canned a pair of 3-pointers. Khalil Messiah drilled another one from the corner.

And Gannon Ginnis’ putback basket gave Fife the lead for good, 44-43, with 1:29 remaining.

“We’ve got some great seniors, and they are competitive kids,” Schelbert said. “They wanted to get greedy, and at that point, we had nothing to lose.”

Olympic (13-12) cut it to 47-45 on Barron’s two free throws with 14.7 seconds remaining, but Afework matched that on the other end — and Fife finished the job.

“This feels really good,” Afework said. “Two years in a row (to state), and I want to get a couple of wins this year and stay longer.”

TEAM STATISTICS

O – Shooting: 17 of 41 (41.5 percent). Free throws: 6 of 7 (85.7). Turnovers: 22.

F – Shooting: 19 of 54 (35.2 percent). Free throws: 8 of 10 (80). Turnovers: 9.

INDIVIDUAL SCORING

O – Brandon Barron 15, Brady Nelson 5, Cadyn Kinsfather 2, Caleb Morgan 12, Greg Brehmer 11.

F – Khalil Messiah 5, Gannon Ginnis 6, Malachi Afework 17, Mchael Steimie 5, Bryson Williams 15.

This story was originally published February 23, 2019 at 2:18 PM.