Thursday's State 2A Girls Basketball: Washougal Defeats W.F. West For Third Time in State Quarterfinals

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YAKIMA — The W.F. West defense was solid against Washougal but wasn’t good enough against the trio of Bea sisters for the Panthers.

Beyonce, Skylar and Jaiden Bea combined to score 40 points in a 49-39 Washougal victory in a State 2A Girls Basketball Tournament quarterfinal game at the SunDome on Thursday night.

The Bearcats take on Black Hills for the fourth time this season at 2 p.m. on Friday back at the SunDome in the fourth place consolation bracket.

Annika Waring led the Bearcats with 13 points and six rebounds. Courtney Bennett and Madi Mencke each chipped in six points and Maggie Vadala tallied a team-high seven rebounds and four assists.

Jaiden led the Bea sisters and all scorers with 16 points. Beyonce Bea and Skylar Bea were each a rebound shy of a double-double, with Beyonce scoring 14 points and nine rebounds and Skylar scoring 10 with nine boards.

“They’re a good team. We face guarded Beyonce Bea there. In the first half, we didn’t get back real good,” Kelly said. “Annika Waring did a good job on her.”

W.F. West and Washougal each shot 34 percent from the field, although the Bearcats were a dismal 3 of 17 from behind the arc and six of 16 from the charity stripe. The Panthers were 15 of 22 at the free throw line and won the rebounding battle 34-32.

“We couldn’t hit our shots. We couldn’t hit shots and their defense is pretty smothering. It’s really good,” Kelly said. “You’ve got to cut back door and stuff and we were early on, I mean everybody’s got to be doing it. Rebounding was better than at the district title game. We just couldn’t hit a shot offensively, couldn’t get nothing going.”

Both teams started slow with Washougal gaining a 12-9 lead after one quarter. The Panthers won the second quarter as well but the Bearcats stayed in the game and trailed just 26-20 at halftime.



“I thought maybe they would be really nervous, we’ve played already and they haven’t been here a lot,” Kelly said. “If you get a good start, maybe it would be different. I don’t know.”

Neither team shot the ball well in the third quarter as W.F. West only scored three points, but Washougal managed just eight for a 34-23 lead going into the fourth quarter.

The Bearcats made a push in the fourth quarter, with a Drea Brumfield bucket inside followed by Madi Mencke banking in a 3-pointer to cut the lead to six with just 5:54 remaining.

“I thought Madi Mencke really gave us a spark, hit a couple 3’s and stuff,” Kelly said. “Her defensive energy, it started to bring us back there. We had a shot.”

It was 36-30 with 4:31 to go but Washougal didn’t allow that spark to become a fire. Beyonce and Jaiden Bea each made buckets plus a free throw down the stretch to pull away for the win.

W.F. West did have the advantage in points in the paint 20-10, but the Washougal bench outscored the W.F. West bench 16-8.

The Bearcats will try to defeat the Wolves one more time this season. W.F. West won both meetings in the regular season and took down Black Hills 62-46 in the district semifinals two weeks ago. The Wolves fell to Clarkston 42-28 on Thursday.

“I like the matchup, I hope we’ve got legs,” Kelly said. “We spent a lot of energy here. It will be a good one.”