Foster had a big lead of 17-10 after the first quarter, only to fritter it away, all away, and then some. But the fact remains that the Bulldogs gave the state's undefeated No. 1-ranked 3A team, the Enumclaw Hornets, a stinging dose of toughness through three quarters before getting buzzed, 56-43, in a West Central/Southwest semifinal at the ShoWare Center in Kent Tuesday.

"Just got outplayed second half," said first year Bulldogs coach Mike Broom, masterfully taking the purple and gold clad team all the way to state right away.

Outplayed or outshot?

"Either one," said Broom, whose team moved from 2A to 3A this season and didn't miss a beat. Broom's predecessor, John Smith, took the Bulldogs to state in his three years as well. So, the tradition continues.

Almost the talk of the state, the Bulldogs were outplayed and outshot in the second half by the state's best Hornets.

Enumclaw kept hitting three pointers throughout the game, shooting better than 50 percent from long range for the game's four quarters: 1-for-2 in the first quarter, 2-for-4 in the second, 1-for-4 in the third, 2-for-3 in the fourth for a 7-for-13 (53%) night. The Bulldogs meanwhile struggled from beyond the arc, hitting only 1-for-8 threes.

The Bulldogs led, 22-17, halfway through the second quarter and kept that five point lead at the end of the second, 29-24.

Then came the third quarter and Cameron Faison looked to be keeping Foster in control, making a driving lay up to make it 31-26. Then, Faison did it again, scoring on a drive and stop at the top of the key and it was 33-26 with 4:31 left in the third.

The Bulldogs' big man, Darius Page, at 6-foot, 9 inches and 250 pounds, put together a nice bit of shooting leading up to this cushion.

The Bulldogs lead time in the third quarter, to note, hitting some feathery jumpers from 20 feet out 3-4 times that had to be having D-1 coaches thinking this kid could be a catch. Especially a good pick-up, knowing Paige scored 17 points per game on average this season, leading his team to a high Seamount League finish. Paige led his team in this one versus the Hornets, scoring 15 points, hauling down a dozen rebounds, and swatting three balls for blocks. Paige had 11 of his 15 points by halftime.

After Faison's back-to-back scores, Faison scored again wtih 4:15 to go in the third quarter, making it 35-28 Bulldogs over the undefeated (23-0) Hornets while themselves 18-6 and unranked.

Things looked good for the Bulldogs, really showing good ball movement, up seven points, with only a quarter and a half to go...
Oh no, the lead was about to disappear. The Hornets went on a 13-2 run to end the third quarter, now leading the Bulldogs, 41-37.

Their fans chanting "defense, defense," and no longer sitting on their hands, mouths closed, completely kept out of the game by the Bulldogs the first half.

And, that score would not change anything but more and more in favor of the Hornets the rest of the way.

"We had 'em for a while," said Paige."We had 'em, let the lead slip through our fingers. They are a good team, No. 1 team in the state. We just couldn't hold onto the lead."

What changed the score from seven in favor of Foster midway through the third quarter to four points in front for Enumclaw by the end of the third was defensive breakdowns.

"We were not being able to rotate on defense. They were getting too many open shots," said Paige.
Throwing screens?

"Yeah, our movement, we couldn't shuffle to the ball," said Paige.

The Hornets made 4-for-7 threes in the third and fourth quarters combined.

"They are a good team, good all around," said Broom. "They have five guys that can shoot. Five guys been playing together for a long time I assume. They really knew each other out there."

But here's something. Foster has two returning starters and that's it. The rest were bench and role players last year. So this Foster team -- in the first half -- was really showing some togetherness moving the ball around to each other. For some reason, it just stopped. Faison scored three baskets in a row in the third quarter, but did very little offensively the whole rest of the game (eight points total). His shots were created on his own, too -- a driving layup, stop and pop, another drive, not off perimeter passing so much getting him open.

Faison knew that things fell apart after the first half.

"We played strong the first half," said Faison. "Got to work on our defense in the second half."

For the first half, Foster took more shots and made more shots, 12-for-20 field goals while Enumclaw was held to 6-for-12 first half shooting twos. Threes favored Enumclaw 2-for-3 to 1-for-3 for Foster and Foster made 2-for-3 free throws and Enumclaw was 3-for-4.

For the game, Foster shot 18-for-36 field goals, so they actually took six more field goals than Enumclaw -- who shot 13-for-30. Just that three point percentage of the two teams that really spelled the difference in this one.

"Tough loss," said Broom.

The Bulldogs made it to the semifinal of districts by virtue of going down to Hudson Bay in Vancouver to play their opening round game and came away with a win. Paige was big in that one.

"Our big kid got going inside, 34 points and 13 rebounds,' said Broom, adding "Our point guard, Ali Cortes had 10 assists against them."

"We will go back to practice for two days before Lakes on Friday," said Broom of action at ShoWare.