Every team wants to get off to a good start, especially in an elimination game.
There’s good starts, and then there’s what W.F. West did against Hockinson on Wednesday. The Bearcats had their best five-plus minute stretch of the season after the opening tip, scoring the first 21 points of the game to instantly build a commanding lead.
“The guys were jacked up,” White said. “I knew they had a little extra something in the tank tonight. I could sense it.”
Hockinson settled in after that, but the Hawks were never able to make a dent in the lead, and the Bearcats advanced to the district quarterfinals with an 80-67 victory.
“There was just relentless effort by all the guys,” W.F. West coach Chris White said. “There was a lot of confidence, and they just played hard for each other. Just a pleasure to watch.”
Even after the Hawks found their footing, the Bearcats made sure to maintain their lead throughout the middle two frames.
Carlos Vallejo, who scored eight points in the opening frame, added eight more across the second and third, while Kelley built on his seven-point first with five more in the next two quarters.
Hayden Rooney scored his nine points across the first three quarters, and Grady Westlund scored six.
Westlund went on to finish the night with nine points, but he also made history on the boards. In the third quarter, he brought down his 330th rebound of the season, breaking Soren Dalan’s record that was set just two years ago.
“That’s really a heck of an accomplishment,” White said. “He gets about 16 a game, it’s crazy … It’s phenomenal.”
Westlund went on to finish with 21 rebounds, marking his third 20-plus rebound game of the season, and he also blocked five shots.
Hockinson made a late push in the fourth, scoring 25 points in the final frame, but they never got within 10 and the Bearcats were able to close it out.
One of the final daggers was a right-handed tomahawk dunk from Gage Brumfield, who finished with six points and eight rebounds.
Vallejo finished with a game-high 22 points, seven rebounds, and six assists, and Ross Kelley scored 12 points while tallying six rebounds and six assists of his own.
Fox Rogerson added five points, Cody Schwarz scored three in his varsity debut, and Wyatt Hoffman added a point, six rebounds, and four assists.
“We’d like to build off this,” White said. “This is the sort of energy we wanna bring to the table. We stayed gritty with our man defense, and I felt like we finally hit some in transition too . It was really fun to see us just kinda play loose and go.”
The Bearcats (12-10) are through to the double-elimination portion of the tournament, and if they can get two wins in their next three games, they’ll return to the regional round for the second year in a row.
In the quarterfinals on Saturday, they’ll face Mark Morris, which went 19-3 (11-3 GSHL) en route to earning the No. 2 seed from the GSHL.
White and his staff are hopeful to take advantage of the extra day, as their pigtail against Hockinson was moved up from Thursday due to the weather forecast.
“It was weird to play today,” White said. “But it works out. Now we got two days to prepare for Mark Morris … We’re just looking forward to Saturday.”
