Lynden girls roll past White River into 2A semifinal
For the Lynden Lions, Thursday night’s Class 2A high school girls basketball quarterfinal game against White River was an “Out With The I, In With the We” event.
It was a smash success.
The No. 4 seed Lions held the third-seeded Hornets to 30 percent field-goal shooting and pummeled White River 64-42 at the SunDome to advance to the semifinals of the state tournament.
Lynden, (19-6) will play No. 2 seed W.F. West in a Friday semifinal at 9 p.m. A berth in the championship game awaits the winner.
Lions coach Rob Adams preached all week to his veteran team the value of playing for the greater good rather than themselves. The Hornets endured the painful results of that learning process coming to fruition.
“We were really proud of our effort and I thought our focus was tremendous,” Adams said. “We’ve been up and down a lot and tonight’s effort really exemplified we, we, we and not I, I, I.”
Adams has said before that despite returning a large part of last year’s state runners-up, this team had to find its own identity. That process seems to be coming together at the right time.
“Every team is different. These kids had to find their rhythm and find their character,” he said.
Lynden also found a defensive rhythm in the second and third periods, breaking the contest open by outscoring the Hornets 41-21.
Senior Elisa Kooiman led Lynden’s scoring with 16 points and grabbed seven rebounds. Jasmyne Neria had 12 points, Sierra Smith had 11 and Faith Dut had 10 points and eight rebounds in 15 minutes off the bench.
“We don’t care who scores or who takes the shots,” Kooiman said. “We just want to play and we want everybody to step up and try to make plays for each other.”
In addition to four players scoring in double figures, the Lions dominated the rebounds 37-23.
“Tonight, kids passed up open shots to get a better shot. When we play like that, we’re pretty fun to watch,” Adams said.
Lynden 64, White River 42
Lynden | 12 | 19 | 22 | 11 | 64 |
White River | 9 | 11 | 10 | 12 | 42 |
LYNDEN — Jasmyne Neria 4-6 1-2 12, Sierra Smith 5-11 0-0 11, Elisa Kooiman 6-16 3-4 16, Vander Haak 2-4 1-2 6, Amos 1-5 0-0 2, Tjoelker 0-1 0-0 0, Zwiers 2-5 0-1 4, Gonzalez 0-2 0-0 0, Faith Dut 5-6 0-0 10, Hershey 1-2 0-0 3, Lankhaar 0-1 0-0 0, Bonsen 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 26-60 5-9 64.
WHITE RIVER — J. Norris 0-2 0-0 0, Rasmussen 2-4 0-0 6, G. Lavinder 1-8 0-0 3, Kendall Bird 2-10 6-8 10, S. Lavinder 0-3 4-4 4, Narloski 1-2 0-2 3, Robbins 2-3 0-1 4, Mills 0-0 0-0 0, Lee Audrey Norris 5-8 0-0 12, Cash 0-3 0-0 0, Tranquillo 0-0 0-0 0, Goethals 0-0 0-0 0. Totals 13-43 10-17 42.
3-point goals - Lynden 7-15 (Neria 3-4, Smith 1-3, Kooiman 1-4, Vander Haak 1-1, Zwiers 0-1, Hershey 1-2); WR 6-13 (J. Norris 0-2, Rasmussen 2-2, G. Lavinder 1-3, Bird 0-1, Narloski 1-1, L. Norris 2-3, Cash 0-1). Fouled-out - None. Rebounds - Lynden 37 (Dut 8, Kooiman 7); WR 23 (Bird 8). Assists - Lynden 3 (Kooiman 2); WR 3 (Rasmussen 2). Turnovers - Lynden 12, WR 12. Total fouls - Lynden 10, WR 14.
This story was originally published March 2, 2017 at 9:44 PM with the headline "Lynden girls roll past White River into 2A semifinal."