SPOKANE — The early start didn’t bother the Indians one bit.
The shots were falling. The passes were crisp. The defense was effective.
At least, for the first quarter — and after that, Toledo let its MVP do the heavy lifting against Lake Roosevelt.
Fano Arceo-Hansen came up big when nothing else seemed to be falling, closing out his prep career with 10 important points to help Toledo take home the fourth-place trophy with a 52-25 win here Saturday in the State 2B Boys Basketball Tournament.
“It’s nice,” Arceo-Hansen said. “It feels really good, because the last couple years we haven’t been able to get it done, but it feels nice.”
It was the first piece of hardware for Toledo since a sixth-place finish in the 1A tournament in 2014, and the highest finish since the Indians’ 1A title in 2013.
Westin Wallace scored 12 with nine rebounds and Andreas Malunat added 12 points for Toledo, which finished the season with a 24-4 record. Two of those losses came to top-ranked Kittitas, and another to Life Christian, which played for third place Saturday afternoon.
“We’re playing pretty good ball at this point, and that’s all you can ask for,” Indians coach Grady Fallon said. “I’m beyond proud.”
On Saturday, Toledo started hot and took advantage of a Lake Roosevelt squad that never quite warmed up after the 8 a.m. tipoff.
Wallace finished off a pair of passes inside to start a 12-0 run, with Malunat chipping in a pair of threes and Brian Wood adding a driving layup. The Raiders, meanwhile, went without a field goal for nearly seven minutes in the first quarter and managed just three points in the second frame.
Toledo, though, ran into its own offensive woes in the middle quarters. Arceo-Hansen scored the Indians’ last bucket of the first half, then ended a 4 1/2-minute scoring drought with a layup midway through the third quarter.
“When he starts getting aggressive and in his aggressive mode, he can take over a game, easily,” Malunat said. “He’s such a good athlete, it’s crazy.”
After a Trevor McCraigie three cut Toledo’s lead to single-digits at 27-19, Arceo-Hansen completed a three-point play, then assisted Hayden Farbo and Wallace on open buckets to close out the third with Toledo up 15.
“It just kind of went stale or stagnant, and we’re counting down from the bench, and he just kind of went, ‘I’m taking it,’” Fallon said of Arceo-Hansen. “He didn’t panic.”
The offense finally awoke from its slumber, with Farbo and Malunat hitting threes early in the fourth quarter. That highlighted a 25-2 run for Toledo that didn’t end until the starters were on the bench with the game, and trophy, in hand.
“We weren’t really running anything on offense, so coach told us we had to slow it down and start running sets, and then we’ll get open shots again,” Arceo-Hansen said. “That’s what we did.”
Arceo-Hansen added five rebounds, three assists, three blocked shots and a pair of steals in his prep finale.
Cameron St. Pierre and Tyler Jordan each scored seven points for Lake Roosevelt, which finished the season with a 21-8 record.
