Olympia beats Sumner, 59-48, takes fourth place in 4A state tournament
The third time’s a charm.
The Sumner High School basketball team has Olympia’s number this season, beating the Bears in each of the two regular season meetings. But in the third meeting of the season — this time in the fourth/sixth place Class 3A state tournament game at the Tacoma Dome on Saturday morning — the Bears came out on top, 59-48
“I think we just finally kind of figured it out,” said Olympia’s Jackson Grant, who scored a game-high 22 points. “We figured out that we had to shut down (Josh) Lear and we finally did that.”
Sumner’s 1-2-2 zone has consistently given teams problems this season, and was good enough to catapult the Spartans, who finished third in the 4A SPSL, into the state tournament at the Tacoma Dome. It took until the third meeting for Olympia to attack it effectively.
“Their zone is just kind of weird, it’s called ‘the buzz’ or some weird zone that nobody even plays,” Grant said. “It’s just kind of hard to figure out the first couple times you play it. So we finally figured it out and everything just clicked at the right time.”
To Olympia coach John Kiley, beating the zone mostly comes down to shooting. Olympia, which set the state tournament record a day prior, shooting 70.2 percent from the field in its win against Skyview, continued its hot shooting against Sumner. The Bears shot 51.2 percent (22-43) from the field against the Spartans and held Sumner to 42.2 percent (19-45) shooting.
“We shot it a little better,” Kiley said. “The zone that they play — like Union showed a few weeks ago — you have to make shots. So I feel like Jackson warming up there in the third and fourth quarter really helped us loosen that up. The more we miss shots, the more they pack that thing in.”
Kai Johnson added 17 points for Olympia. Lamar Campbell led Sumner with 17 points and Josh Lear added nine.
Olympia’s fourth-place finish is the program’s best since 2011. The Bears also took fourth that year.
“Obviously, it wasn’t our overall goal at winning state, but to come back and not lose two games back-to-back and end on a win — there’s only three teams in the state that get to end their season on a win, and it’s the highest finish we’ve had in a long time,” Grant said. “It felt really good to send the seniors off this way.
“We were really just connected and knew we could still have a strong finish, tied for fifth-best in school history. So I think we were sad when we realized we couldn’t win state, but we just really rallied and realized we still had two more games and could still do something really special.”
Sumner’s sixth-place finish is the program’s best since a fourth-place finish in 1970. Sumner’s win against Kentwood in the 4A state tournament regional round was its first state win in 49 years and the Spartans had perhaps the tournament’s most entertaining game, knocking out defending state champion Gonzaga Prep in the first round, 60-59.
