Grandview players celebrate following their 42-41 comeback victory over Pullman on Thursday night in the Class 2A state tournament.   JEFF HALLER/Yakima Herald-Republic View all photos for this story.

Down 10, Grandview charges back in fourth
to beat Pullman 42-41 and gain semis

By ROGER UNDERWOOD
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC

They are supposed to have words of wisdom for their players once games have ended, spoken thoughts that put the sweetest victories or most distasteful defeats into some sort of perspective.

Even comparatively young coaches like Grandview’s Scott Parrish.

But when the Greyhounds gathered in their SunDome locker room Thursday night, Parrish offered a confession instead of an assessment.

“Guys,” he said, making collective eye contact with his team, “I have no idea how you just did that.”

And no wonder.

Because it seemed that no one else who witnessed or participated in Grandview’s 42-41 victory over Pullman in a Class 2A state quarterfinal battle of Greyhounds had an answer, either.

No one was certain how Grandview won despite its second straight substandard shooting performance, how it advanced to the tournament’s final four despite trailing by 10 points after a nightmarish third quarter, or how it sustained its state championship hopes despite going scoreless for the final 2:24.

Take it from senior standout Chris Mejia, who neither knew nor cared.

“All I know is we were still pumped when we were behind and we knew we could come back,” said Mejia, the game’s only double-figure scorer with 15 points and who muscled home the game-winner in heavy traffic. “We’ve done it before.”

Next up? Quincy, a 46-40 winner over Steilacoom on Thursday night and a team Grandview handled 73-49 in a CWAC district semifinal.

Even Parrish, however, admitted to not being overly optimistic after what he called a “weird” third period against Pullman.

Grandview scored only three points during that eight-minute span, getting its only field goal — fittingly, it seemed — off an offensive rebound by Adam Dion.

In the process the Greyhounds saw a 22-20 halftime deficit swell to 31-21 with 4:07 left in the period and remain 33-23 at the break.

But Grandview kept attacking Pullman’s predominantly man-to-man defense with its quickness and got back in the game via a quarter-opening basket by Anthony Andrews followed by seven consecutive free throws.

Offset only by hoops from George Turner and Ashton Gant, the surge put the Greyhounds within 37-32 with 5:20 to play.

A bucket and free throw by Andrews at 3:33 narrowed the gap to 39-38, after which junior reserve Brandon Artz sent Grandview’s large contingent of fans into a frenzy with a steal and breakaway layup for a 40-39 Greyhound lead at 3:12.

“It’s a play we work on every day in practice with our press,” said Artz. “When we see the bounce pass come back toward our man, we’re supposed to go get it, and that’s what I did.”

Following a missed one-and-one free throw opportunity by Pullman, Grandview worked the ball inside to Mejia, who had shown no residual effects from Wednesday’s 0-for-7 shooting and three-point total in a 55-48 conquest of Mount Baker.

His layup through a maze of arms at 2:24 brought an end to the scoring, but not the drama.

Pullman’s Kyle Hinrichs drove hard to the basket and scored while being fouled with 1:36, although he missed the free throw.

After an exchange of turnovers, Grandview point guard James Vela went to the foul line via a double-bonus infraction at 0:44, but missed both.

Cordero Cisneros got a similar chance at 0:12.2 after rebounding an inside jumper by Pullman’s Brian Pan, but he, too, missed both.

Two timeouts were then called by Pullman coach Ken Swanger with eight seconds to play and his team in possession at midcourt. A pass along the right side of the key was deflected out of bounds by Grandview with 1.7 seconds left.

Pullman then inbounded from its right baseline to Ben Hein, but his heavily pressured 3-pointer hit the backboard and got a piece of the rim before falling away.

“We weren’t sure what they were going to run,” Parrish said, “but we came out in a (2-3) zone, then had our kids switch back to man after the first pass. That might have confused them.

“The whole game was just hard to explain. We kept trying to attack the basket throughout the game, but we couldn’t get shots to drop. Then there were those free throws late — man, that one Cordero shot was halfway down and then spun out. But as far as whether we could come back when we were down 10, there was no doubt in my mind.”

And because the Greyhounds did, their winning streak reached 17, their record improved to 23-2 and their number of consecutive state victories in the SunDome ran to eight, dating back to Grandview’s fourth-place finish in 2000.