With a regular season record of 4-16 this year, the Mountlake Terrace Hawks’ girls basketball team certainly showed their age and inexperience this year. The roster included five freshmen and two sophomores, all getting significant playing time and all taking their lumps at the high school varsity level.

But despite the record, the Hawks were granted another chance for more playing time in the form of a No. 11 seed in the postseason District 1/2 2A Girls Basketball Tournament. The berth brought with it a tournament loser-out game against the No. 6 seed Sammamish Totems, which ended with a 65-44 Hawk defeat in the district tourney game played at Sammamish High School.

With the loss, Terrace saw its 2019-2020 season come to an end.

Sammamish, a team that entered Wednesday’s contest averaging 44.9 points per game, lit up the scoreboard with 24 first-quarter points. The Totems used runs of 10-0 and 8-0 during the first eight minutes to quickly take control of the game.

The Totems’ first-quarter point explosion was fueled by a stifling half-court defense that resulted in 10 Terrace turnovers. “Turnovers led to wide open lay-ups and yes, we got blitzed after that,” said Hawks’ Coach Nick Sherrill. “So hats off to them; they came out and put the pressure on us. We’re young and we panic sometimes.”

Junior Mackenzie Perez led Sammamish in scoring with 15 points, nine in the first quarter.

Three other Totems reached double figures in scoring for the game: Kiana Lizardo and Grace Patterson each had 11 points while Katelyn Nagel contributed 10 points.

Terrace settled down after the first, committing just seven turnovers over the remainder of the contest and showing periodic sparks of momentum. But the early hole proved too deep to dig out of and the team ended their season with a loss.

Elisa Colvin scored 12 points to lead the Hawks offensively; all 12 players on the Terrace roster did get some playing time and all but two made it into the scoring column.

Sherrill liked the way his team responded to the big early deficit by not giving up.

“It easily could have been a 40-point game,” Sherrill stated, “(but) everybody left it on the court. We could have boxed out a little better, (rebounded more) 50-50 balls, but they definitely competed on the offensive end, stayed locked in and didn’t give up.”

After Wednesday’s season-ending defeat, Sherrill — in his first year as head coach — was already looking forward to getting his Hawks back in the gym for the month-long spring schedule of practices and scrimmages that are allowed under WIAA rules.

“I can’t wait for June 1 to get here so we can get back to work and get back at it,” he said.

To view the entire 2020 District 1/2 2A Girls Basketball Tournament bracket, click www.wescoathletics.com/tournament.php?tournament_id=3024&sport=12.

Prep Girls Basketball: Mountlake Terrace at Sammamish, Feb. 12 (District 1/2 2A Girls Basketball Tournament loser-out game)

Terrace 10 6 12 16 — 44
Sammamish 24 11 18 12 — 65

Mountlake Terrace individual scoring: Elise Colvin 12, Kierra Scott 5, Berit Simonsen 5, Ainsley Ward 5, Kaiya Beavin 4, Lindsey Ho 3, Maile Armstrong 3, Mya Sheffield 3, Cameron Dunn 2, Amber Stradling 2, Ainslee Beach, Bailey Sonko

Sammamish individual scoring: Mackenzie Perez 15, Grace Patterson 11, Kiana Lizardo 11, Katelyn Nagel 10, Sarah Skaggs 6, Kim Geiger-Lazo 4, Katelyn Bland 2, Amara Thomas 2, Katie Anderson 2, Skylar Littrell 1, Jessica Pelayo 1, Hannah Nash

Records: Mountlake Terrace 4-17 overall; Sammamish 14-7 overall

Mountlake Terrace next game: 2019-2020 season completed

— By Doug Petrowski