They are the two hardwood goliaths of Class 1A, Lynden Christian and King’s. Boys and girls basketball combined, they are the winners of twenty-two state championships, including the boys-girls sweep King’s completed last March in Yakima. So far, this season has been a particularly good one for the two private Christian schools. The Lyncs entered the weekend as the No. 1 team in the state in both genders, according to the AP, and both teams from King’s were ranked No. 3.
They had not yet played each other, though, which made Saturday’s double-header — Lynden Christian vs. King’s girls at 5:30, the boys following a half-hour later — all the more appealing. The rainswept drive from Seattle to Mt. Vernon H.S. was not, but I made it anyway, and settled into my place in the bleachers of the big, old, wooden barn a few minutes before tip.
The first thing to note is that Idaho-bound senior Daylee Hanson did not start for King’s. The hyper-athletic, 5-foot-11 guard teamed with older sister Savanna Hanson — now at Santa Clara — to lead the Knights to the state title last year, and is the team’s best player this season. And yet for whatever reason, she did not see the floor on Saturday night until there was 3:13 remaining in the first quarter and Lynden Christian had already built an 11-4 lead (note that margin) behind some hot shooting by Haley Hollander. When Hanson finally entered the game in between two LC free throws, her impact was as immediate as could be: She rebounded a missed free throw, started a fast break, fed teammate Anna Parker for an easy basket, and then stole the ball back from the Lyncs on the very next possession.
Parker finished with a game-high 18 points, and Hanson with 12; they may well have been the two best players on the floor. But Lynden Christian was the better team, starting with Hollander (15 points) and extending down low, where 6-foot-2 Kara Bajema and 6-foot-1 Sam Van Loo give the Lyncs unparalleled size for a Class 1A outfit. Bajema has the typical big’s desire to float around the perimeter and shoot 3-pointers, but she’s a monster when she parks herself on the block, possessing some seriously nice touch and the sort of length and nimbleness that make her a top-flight volleyball recruit (off to the UW in the fall). She had 10 of her 16 points in the first half, and the Lyncs opened a 29-19 lead at the break.
Throughout the third and fourth quarters, Hanson and Parker did their best to bring the Knights back. Parker seemingly shot 80 percent on 15-foot lefty runners from the baseline. When driving to the hole, Hanson often focuses too much on drawing contact at the expense of putting herself in position to actually score, but she made a couple ridiculous shots Saturday night, including one from about 15 feet early in the third quarter that she launched from mid-air with her body parallel to the ground.
The rest of the Knights didn’t contribute much in the way of scoring, although they showed a serious knack for draining open 12-footers. Abbi Echelbarger made one such hoop with three minutes left to cut the score to 49-46, but King’s never came closer. Bajema made a clutch bucket inside to make it a five-point game, and once Hanson fouled out — a development met with an unusual amount of glee by the Lyncs fans — it was all but over. Lynden Christian won 53-46, a seven-point margin which, if you’ll recall, equaled the lead LC built up in the first five minutes of the game while Hanson sat on the bench. If and when the two team meet again at state in three weeks time, it’s easy to imagine things unfolding differently.
The nightcap wasn’t nearly so close. The first three minutes were plagued by missed shots, and we appeared on track for a similar low-scoring, defensive-minded contest to last year’s state title tilt, in which the Knights defeated the Lyncs, 45-40. But then Corey Kispert got going.
Class 1A is probably the lowest classification where you encounter bona fide Division I talent, and the 6-foot-6 King’s junior undoubtedly qualifies, reportedly boasting scholarship offers from Gonzaga, Washington, Utah, and other major programs. He has the smoothest, sweetest jumper I’ve seen on a prep floor this winter, the athleticism to throw down some serious dunks, and the smarts to be able to get his points without totally dominating the offense. His game allows others to excel, too. Kispert finished Saturday night with 27 points, but teammates Cole Mitchell (16 points) and Koa Wilkins (14 points) also played major roles.
Really, it was over by the 2:42 mark in the second quarter, when a Kispert bucket gave King’s a 31-14 lead. Lynden Christian’s fleet of 6-foot-1 or 6-foot-2 upperclassmen who play really hard and can sometimes shoot the lights out just wasn’t enough — although one of those shooting-the-lights-out stretches allowed the Lyncs to draw within five points, at 37-32, early in the third quarter.
In the end, it was Mitchell — an explosive 6-foot-1 guard — who put things out of reach, going on a personal 8-0 run to give the Knights a 61-40 edge early in the fourth quarter; in all, they closed the game on a 41-21 run. LC has a nice team, but in just about every facet — size, shooting, athleticism — they were a step behind the Knights on Saturday. It was just one game, obviously, but there is now a clear front-runner for the Class 1A state title. And it’s not the team that has spent most of the season ranked No. 1.