The Kentwood High School boys basketball team is in almost an identical position as a year ago, 12-4 through 16 games. Kentwood won its 12th game of the season Monday, Jan. 20 at the accesso ShoWare Center against Glacier Peak on a Corey Tita bucket with 4 seconds remaining.
Trailing by as many as 17 points in the first half, Kentwood crawled all the way back to trail by one point with 12 seconds left in the game, 51-50. After a time out, Brandon Tagle found Tita right under the basket for the game-winning basket on an almost dunk for a 52-51 victory.
“We have trust in what we are doing, our guys execute really well and then we just got guys that make plays,” Kentwood Head Coach Blake Solomon said.
The Grizzlies came in as the second-ranked team at the 4A level according to the RPI poll released by the WIAA every week. Kentwood was 13 in the same poll.
Kentwood has been no stranger to late game heroics this season. Kentwood trailed all game until the final 4 seconds.
“We got some big-time players on our team and big-time players make big-time plays,” Mason St. Louis said.
In the first half, it wasn’t so much of Kentwood playing poorly. But more of Glacier Peak coming out on fire. Normally at games inside the ShoWare Center, it’s a slow start. Teams are adjusting to the environment, adjusting to the court and because of that teams miss shots early. But Glacier Peak flipped that script and took a 21-9 lead after the first quarter and even took a 26-9 lead at the start of the second.
“They’re ranked number one for a reason…They run so many good actions, if we were going to go man they were going to be able to find open shots. We figured early on we needed to go ‘12’ and that helped us make them a little more stagnant,” Solomon said.
The Grizzlies fell back to earth in the second quarter with just a nine-point quarter. The reason? Solomon switched to a zone defense an 1-2-2 zone, which flipped the game on its head.
From the first half to the second half, Kentwood sliced 18% from the Grizzlies field goal percentage and 17% from three-point land.
Kentwood is undersized. Glacier Peak had two players at 6 feet 4 inches tall and two players taller. Kentwood doesn’t have any taller than 6-4. At times, Brandon Tagle was defending players who were five inches taller than him, and they were successful at it.
“Our guys responded and bought in and were all in. I think we are trending in the right direction if we can keep it going,” Solomon said.
At halftime, Kentwood was down 30-16, but seemed to be figuring things out. In the third quarter, Tagle and Tita got going offensively. They combined for eight points in the first half, and in the third quarter they combined for 14 (Tita 8, Tagle 6). Kentwood scored 17 third-quarter points, one more than their first half total.
“We just made sure to play together as a group. A big message we had was play all 32 minutes, I think tonight we were able to do that… We didn’t give up on each other,” St. Louis said.
Kentwood’s defense came alive in the second half and really took it to the Grizzlies. They forced 17 turnovers and outscored Glacier Peak 16-7 off turnovers. Aaron Ton is back to fully healthy and playing extremely good defense.
“Aaron and Jacob (Bail) were really big for us… They are always going to play hard and that’s what you need. They were really big on the defensive end,” St. Louis said.
St. Louis, Tita and Tagle are names that the basketball community in Washington are starting to recognize, but Ton is another one on the Kentwood roster that is starting to make an impact.
“Aaron is arguably our best on-ball defender and he can make shots. He gives us a guy who can come in and guard a teams best player and keep guys in front,” Solomon said.
Obviously, the biggest shot of the night was Tagle to Tita for the win. But the set up for that opportunity came from St. Louis from the left wing draining a pair of three pointers to pull Glacier Peak within reach.
“He’s leading our league in scoring and gotten so much better… Mase was able to find the right line and make two really huge threes,” Solomon said.
St. Louis had missed his previous three attempts from long range, but hit two key threes.
“It all comes from preparation and next shot mentality. I don’t think I had any threes, but I knew if I got the ball and I’m open, I am going to shoot it,” St. Louis said.
After a shot clock violation because of the hyperaggressive defense, Kentwood put the ball in Tagle’s hands and he found Tita for the win.
Kentwood next hosts a sneaky Stadium team at 7 p.m. Jan. 24.
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