Class 4A girls tournament: Prairie ends Redmond's perfect ride

TACOMA — Second-ranked Redmond's ride to perfection ran afoul last night.

And straight into a train known as the Prairie Falcons.

The previously unbeaten Mustangs missed 41 of 56 shots from the field in last night's 52-43 loss to No. 3 Prairie in semifinals of the Class 4A state girls basketball tournament at the Tacoma Dome. Consequently, they missed an opportunity to return to the championship game for the second time in three years.

"They were on a mission and our shots weren't falling," Redmond Coach Pat Bangasser said. "It's disappointing. We expected to be in that big game (tonight's championship). I can't say they wanted it any more than we did. They just executed better than we did."

Prairie (27-2) from suburban Vancouver will meet No. 1 Central Valley (27-1) of Spokane in tonight's 7 o'clock championship. Central Valley stopped No. 9 Garfield's improbable run through the state tournament 64-59 in last night's late semifinal.

Prairie's three seniors wore their desire last night, each drawing a red ring around her ring finger: A symbol of the state championship ring they long for after losing last year's championship game to Central Valley.

"We want to go out and get a ring for ourselves," Jessica Menkens said.

The senior trio — Menkens, Ticey Westbrooks and Lauren Short — combined for 36 of Prairie's 52 points and all but three in the 15-point fourth quarter.

"It was definitely senior night tonight," Menkens said.

The Prairie Falcons are semifinal veterans. This was their sixth straight, and they've now won five of them. But they haven't taken the title since winning in 1999, when they won their second of back-to-back titles.

It was a night of futility for Redmond (25-1), which had survived a pair of nail-biters in the first two rounds of the tournament.

"We definitely expected to win," senior guard Ashley Graham said. "We've worked hard all year, but they came into the game stronger than us. Their shots fell and ours didn't."

The Mustangs, who had won 27 games in a row since losing in the quarterfinals of last year's tournament, had a share of the lead at halftime, 21-all, but then it all unraveled. Westbrooks hit a pair of three-pointers to key a 10-3 run that put the Falcons in control. Westbrooks scored 10 of her 14 points in a determined second half.

"It's our final year," she said of the three seniors. "We wanted to leave everything on the floor."

Redmond cut Prairie's lead to five, 35-30, late in the third quarter, but the Falcons pulled away with a 9-2 spurt.

Sophomore Mackenzie Flynn was the only Redmond player in double figures with 11. Alex Tosti and USC-bound Katie Henderson came off the bench to deliver eight points each. The Mustangs, who placed fourth last year, vowed to come back and finish the season on a high note, which would net them the third-place trophy. But they'll wake up this morning wondering what might have been, if they could have made another shot or two.

"We felt in our hearts we had a team that could have won the state title this year," Bangasser said.

But the Prairie Falcons feel that way, too. Tonight, they'll get the chance to fulfill that dream.