Kentridge’s Jaylen Keowla wins it in final moments over Jackson

Published 3:45 pm Monday, December 22, 2025

It’s been a roller coaster of a week for the Kentridge boys basketball team as the Chargers played their third game in five days against Jackson High School of Mill Creek and won 47-46 while playing at Tahoma High School on Dec. 20.

Down a point with 8 seconds to go, Jaylen Keowla stole an inbound pass and proceeded to make the break away layup to give Kentridge the one-point lead they would hold over the final seconds for the win.

“He’s been so awesome. He started the last half of the year as a freshman and kept getting more and more confidence,” head coach Zac Webb said.

After a 27-point loss to Auburn to start the week, Kentridge followed that up with a thrilling three-point win at home against Tahoma. In both the Tahoma and Jackson games, the Chargers had to rely on fourth quarter execution, and in both games were successful at it.

“All of us hate losing more than we love winning. We really just don’t want to lose. We just have to keep each other pushing. We know what our goals are,” Keowla said.

Damien Diaz had his best scoring quarter in the fourth with five of his 11 points coming in the final stanza. Diaz has taken massive steps to become a presence on the floor, and in the fourth quarter it showed.

“He’s just one of the toughest guys on the team. He’s just tenacious and rebounds the heck out of the ball. He just attacks it. His offensive game has also came around,” Webb said.

Keowla had a quick burst of nine points in the first quarter, but then didn’t make a field goal until his game-winning layup in the final seconds of the game. With a teammate like Giovanni Moimoi, Keowla has more opportunities to score early, as the Kentridge offense adjusts to what the defense shows early. Keowla took advantage of that against Jackson, scoring nine of Kentridge’s first 11 points.

Kentridge was down 16-11 at the end of the first quarter, but began the second quarter on an 11-0 run to take control and really dominate the second quarter. Moimoi had his best quarter from the field, recording two made field goals and a free throw, helping Kentridge head to the locker rooms with a 26-23 advantage.

“It felt like every time we had a chance to pull away, they were just so scrappy and played really hard. They did something defensively to take Gio out of the game and we kept trying to make adjustments to try and get him the ball,” Webb said.

One of the catalysts in the first half was sophomore Ethan Morrow. The youngster had a steal that led to a fast break along with other strong defensive stands across a solid eight minute stretch in the first half. He was a C-Team and JV player last season before making the jump to varsity this year.

“You can tell he’s just a kid who improved. He improved his game and his jumper. He took a lot of what we told him after the season to heart. He showed out in tryouts,” Webb said. “He’s just a hooper.”

In the third quarter, it was a war of attrition on the offensive side of the floor. Jackson leveled the score at 34-34 heading into the fourth quarter and held Kentridge to just eight points.

Moimoi and Diaz combined for 10 points in the fourth, and in a game that in the final two minutes had five lead changes, the weight of each basket was felt throughout the Tahoma gymnasium.

With the ball out of bounds, Keowla marked Jackson’s point guard Joey Gosline as they both awaited the inbound pass from in front of the Kentridge bench. The pass went in, errantly, looking almost like it was intended for Keowla. He corralled it, took a single dribble and made the layup with 3.2 on the clock.

“The play before I missed a layup, so I thought I owed it to my team and everyone watching,” Keowla said.

Following the make, all Jackson had left was a half-court heave that was not close, and Kentridge had survived.

“We have certain drills that we practice every day to be ready for those moments and execute,” Keowla said.

Kentridge is now off for the rest of winter break before they come back and take on Auburn Riverside on Jan. 6, and a big rivalry game against Kentwood on Jan. 8.