Metro League supremacy: Garfield girls, Eastside Catholic boys notch wins to earn SeaKing titles

BELLEVUE, Wash. – All season long, the question has been whether Garfield or Lake Washington is the top Class 3A girls team in the state.

Rightfully so, defending-champion Garfield has taken the top spot in nearly every set of rankings.

With a 66-55 win over the Kangs Saturday night, the Bulldogs claimed the 3A girls SeaKing championship and reaffirmed their position at the top.

"It gives us a boost of confidence," Garfield coach Tre Simmons said of the win. "Coming in and heading into regionals and state, everyone has been saying it's Lake Washington and Garfield – who's the top dog? I just told them to stay even-keeled the whole game."

The first half almost entirely played out the way you would expect with the state's top two teams playing each other.

Good offense with both teams seemingly unable to miss defined a high-scoring first quarter with the Kangs ahead 24-20 after eight minutes.

The back-and-forth battle didn't stop in the second quarter until Lake Washington was able to string together stops and scores to pull ahead 32-26 with 2:39 left in the half.

But from there, it was all Garfield.

Closing the half on an 8-1 run, the Bulldogs led 34-33 at halftime and that was the closest it would be the rest of the way.

"I just told them that regardless of how many fouls you have or how many fouls we have to keep playing aggressive," Simmons said. "We want to always be the aggressor. Referees can't make every call, so that was our main focus."

Garfield ultimately broke Lake Washington's back in the second half, pulling ahead by as many as 17, thanks in part to a huge effort on the offensive glass by the Bulldogs.

"My teammate Rakiyah Jackson – she was just flying and getting the ball," senior forward Imbie Jones said. "It was just a great effort. It gave us second-chance points and I think that's what really cracked our lead, as well."

Whenever it looked like the Kangs forced Garfield into a bad shot or had finally gotten a stop, the Bulldogs came crashing down for the offensive board and second-chance points.

"I was surprised, I'm not going to lie," Simmons said of his team's rebounding. "We did a hell of a job of running our offense, too, and keeping girls out of the paint in the second half."

Jones scored a team-high 20 points for the Bulldogs with junior guard Katie Fiso not far behind with 19.

Lake Washington was led by senior forward Sydney Hani who started the game on fire, scoring 16 points in the first half.

Hani scored a game-high 23 points, but was held to only seven in the second half which could be attributed to an emphasis from Garfield on clogging up lanes on the right side and making the Kangs move left with the ball.

"We knew a couple of their players like to go hard right, so we tried to force them the other way," Simmons said.

The Bulldogs next step in defending their state title will be at regionals next weekend where they await their pairing.

Eastside Catholic boys 65, O'Dea 59

Eastside Catholic can add a 3A boys SeaKing championship to its resume this season after outlasting O'Dea, 65-59, Saturday night in Bellevue.

The Crusaders, who also won the Metro League championship last week, have had to not only play Rainier Beach and O'Dea for the Metro and SeaKing titles in the last two weeks, but have also had to take down Garfield twice in that stretch.

Eastside Catholic coach Brent Merritt pointed out that while they've beaten some very good teams, there was also a stretch where they lost three games in a row to close out the regular season.

"I don't really feel like we're on a run," Merritt said. "While we were losing those games I saw where we were going. Guys have bought in."

Out in front for the Crusaders was senior Kayden Lamebull-Ingram with a game-high 21 points. Junior Jacob Cofie added 19.

"Metro is the toughest league and we beat up on each other all year," Merritt said. "It gets you ready and nobody goes through the grind that Metro teams do."

Senior Miles Clark scored a team-high 16 points for the Fighting Irish.

Both teams are onto regionals next week with pairings being announced Sunday.