LAKEWOOD — The Peninsula Pirates aren’t the team that won the Northwest Athletic Conference championship last year.
They’re the team that lost to Bellevue on Sunday and took fifth at Pierce College’s Raiders Invitational women’s basketball tournament.
“If we’re going to go off our last game, which is what we always say, then we’re not a very good team right now,” Peninsula coach Alison Crumb said.
“We have to get better.”
The Pirates went 1-2 at the three-day tournament. They opened Friday with a 72-55 victory over Tacoma, their second win of the season over the Titans. Peninsula then lost to Lane 82-72 in a rematch of March’s NWAC championship game Saturday.
The Pirates finished the tournament with a 65-57 loss to North Region rival Bellevue on Sunday.
That last loss is the one that sticks in Crumb’s craw.
“We just expected to show up and play against Bellevue,” she said.
“We didn’t play with a great sense of urgency to win that game.”
Peninsula turned the ball over 35 times, and the Bulldogs turned that sloppiness into 24 points.
“You can’t turn the ball over as much as we turned the ball over,” Crumb said.
“It’s just weird and careless. Especially with the type of ball-handlers we have and that they’re mostly sophomores.
“We were off all game. It’s really hard to get in rhythm when every other possession you’re throwing the ball away.”
The Pirates dominated the boards 53-24. In fact, they had one less offensive rebound than Bellevue had total rebounds.
But there were a lot of offensive rebounds to be had because Peninsula shot only 35 percent from the field, including 2 for 10 from 3-point range.
Mikayla Jones put up 28 points for Bellevue.
The Pirates were led by Zhara Laster and Cierra Moss, who each scored 13 points.
Laster also had 12 rebounds, three assists and two steals.
She had an even better showing against Lane, scoring 18 points, pulling down 15 boards and making seven steals. She also dished out a team-high three assists.
She was picked for the all-tournament team after averaging 13.3 points, 10.7 rebounds, 4.3 steals and 2.7 assists over the three games.
Cierra Moss led Peninsula with 22 points against Lane, also nicknamed the Titans, while freshman Anaya Rodisha scored a season-high 15 points, and Imani Smith contributed 10 points.
Rodisha injured her ankle early against Bellevue and only played six minutes in Sunday’s game.
The Pirates played their cleanest game against Lane, turning the ball over only 11 times. But they only made 34 percent of their field goal attempts. The Titans, meanwhile, made 44 percent.
“I think we played well against Lane,” Crumb said, “We just didn’t shoot well.
“You’re just not going to win against a team like them if you don’t hit some shots.”
Shelby Snook scored 20 points for Lane, and Jordan Kimbrough, the tournament MVP, finished with 17 points and 13 rebounds.
Peninsula rolled over Tacoma from the start, outscoring the Titans 28-12 in the first quarter and never looking back.
Cherish Moss scored 16 points to lead the Pirates, while Cierra Moss and Smith each scored 10 points and Laster had nine.
Daijhan Cooks pulled down a team-high seven rebounds to go along with four points.
After finishing last season on fire and opening 2015-16 by winning its first six games and earning the No. 1 ranking in the first NWAC coaches poll of the season, Peninsula has dropped three of its last four.
“I think failure is good early in the season, just to keep you motivated,” Crumb said. “It’s humbling to lose three of the last four games — it’s like, ‘Whoa, we’re not that good.’”
While the Pirates (7-3) are realizing their vulnerabilities, Crumb also recognizes that they’ve lost to three good teams in fourth-ranked Wenatchee Valley (7-1), second-ranked Lane (7-0), which is the last undefeated team in the NWAC, and Bellevue (4-2).
Even championship teams lose to teams like that.
“One of the things we have to remember is that we lost to all three of those teams last year and still ended up where we wanted to be,” Crumb said.
“We just need to use these as motivation.
“I don’t think our goals have changed, I don’t think our perspective of ourselves has changed.”
The Pirates will most certainly shed the No. 1 ranking when the next coaches poll comes out later this week, and that’s fine with Crumb.
That ranking had as much, if not more, to do with last season’s title team than what this year’s squad had accomplished. And now Peninsula can focus on blazing its own trail to the postseason rather than striving to live up to what the 2014-15 accomplished.
“I hope it helps us get hungry and sort of puts us back in our place,” Crumb said.
“I don’t like being No. 1 in the first place. I was a little bit frustrated. It’s a little misleading because we had only played four teams.
“Now we can just work on getting better.
“We’re learning, and we’re still learning who we are.”
The other thing to remember is that the Pirates have opened the season with a savage schedule.
Their first 10 games have all been on the road, and they’ve logged more than 1,400 miles of travel over the past four weeks (and that doesn’t include all the individual travel by the players who returned home for Thanksgiving).
Peninsula finally gets to play in front of a home crowd this week when it hosts Battle in the Olympics, the NWAC North Region crossover tournament Thursday through Saturday.
The Pirates open the eight-team tournament against South Puget Sound (6-2), the current West Region leader that features former Port Angeles High School players Krista Johnson and Lenora Hofer.
Thursday’s action begins with Spokane facing Lane at 1 p.m., followed by Centralia versus Shoreline at 3 p.m., and Big Bend playing Portland at 5 p.m.
The losers of Thursday’s games play Friday at 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., while the winners take the court at 5 p.m. and 7 p.m. (the Peninsula-South Puget Sounds winner plays the late game).
Peninsula will get a rematch with Lane in the championship game Saturday at 4 p.m. if both teams win their first two games of the tournament.
“I love playing that team,” Crumb said. “I hope we get a chance to play them again this weekend.”
Admission to the tournament is $6 per day for adults, and $4 for seniors (55 and older), veterans and youth ages 13-17. Peninsula College students and children 12 and younger get in for free.
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Sports Editor Lee Horton can be reached at 360-417-3525 or at lhorton@peninsuladailynews.com.
