After a horrendous fourth quarter defensive collapse in a Tuesday, February 9, 61-50 playoff loss to Kentwood for the South Puget Sound League North second spot into the league tournament, the Federal Way girls basketball team regained its trademark, physical defense to demolish Puyallup 46-28 in an SPSL 4A tournament game held at Thomas Jefferson High School on Friday, February 12.

Federal Way (18-4) went on to play Rogers (Puyallup) on Saturday, February 13, at Kent's ShoWare Center to decide the fourth place and fifth place seeds to the West Central/Southwest 4A bi-district tournament.

The Vikings broke the press and got good ball movement against the Federal Way zone to stay close for one half.

Carefully cradling a 19-16 edge heading into the second half, the Eagles buried the Vikings in the third quarter with a clamp down man-to-man defense that forced seven turnovers and limited Puyallup to one field goal with 1:51 remaining before the fourth quarter.

"Coach told us to get in their face and that they didn't want to dribble," explained junior guard Brittany Barrington, who wrestled for 15 points and eight rebounds. "We had to, as coach says, get our swagger back after Kentwood. I think we did."
This Viking dry spell enabled Federal Way to forge a 14-2 run into a 33-18 dominance to begin the final stanza.
"At practice, we worked solely on defense the last few days," Federal Way head coach Danny Graham stated. When we went to a man, we knew we could press them pretty hard and get some turnovers. We focused on stops."

Puyallup still had some fight left and trimmed the lead to 38-26 with just more than four minutes remaining before the Eagles responded on back-to-back possessions with a layup by 6-foot-1 Talia Walton and a putback basket by Barrington.

Walton was challenging inside with 13 points, 11 rebounds and three blocked shots for Federal Way. Darah Huertas-Vining helped with six rebounds, six assists and four steals.