Meet The Mount Tahoma Anteaters

Charles Pinkett scored 32 points in Mount Tahoma’s loser-out win over Lewis and Clark in the State AAA boys basketball tournament Thursday morning.

Credit a change in diet.

The 5-foot-9 senior guard said he got his protein from the eggs the coaches cooked at 5 a.m. at the Tacoma school before the Thunderbirds departed for KeyArena.

The T-Birds also had the 9 a.m. opener on Wednesday, but fell to Redmond as Pinkett made just 3 of 14 shots. He didn’t blame his lack of protein, but did say he was sick all day after finding ants crawling all over his breakfast.

Apparently the ants were in the syrup he poured over his pancakes.

Pinkett’s appetite was spoiled, but the other players had good games - of course, since Pinkett was the last to eat, the others didn’t notice if they had a little protein boost, and obviously tried not to think about it.

Superstition

Eisenhower’s Ed Erickson was ready for the hecklers before the Cadets’ quarterfinal game with defending state champion Evergreen Thursday night.

When the Ike reserve got into Wednesday’s opening game with Foss, fans noticed he had his shorts on backwards.

He could have turned them around at halftime, but with the Cadets up 48-27, he didn’t want to take a chance of changing anything. When Ike went on to win 93-62, Erickson, who almost tripled his season average with 15 points, decided not to tempt fate.

“We played so well, I can’t change them for the rest of the tournament,” the 6-3 senior said.

Momentum

LC was battling more than just a good basketball team in its Wednesday opener against top-ranked and undefeated Sehome. The Mariners have adopted the Seattle Mariners’ “Refuse to Lose” motto that served the baseball team so well. The other side of their warmup shirt says “Year of the Mariners.” The Mariner Moose even posed with the team for the team’s schedule poster.

Master Key

KeyArena, home of the State AAA boys tournament as well as the AAA girls semifinals and championship, has been drawing rave reviews, but future use of the Sonics’ home court is in question.

The Washington Interscholastic Activities Association only signed a one-year agreement, leaving the possibility of returning to the Kingdome, which housed both the boys and girls last year.

KeyArena is terrific, until you see the inequity of having the girls play most of their games in Mercer Arena, which can best be described as a dump.

“We wanted to see how it worked with Mercer Arena and KeyArena for at least one year,” WIAA executive director Mike Colbrese said.

He added that the Seattle Center, which operates both facilities, and the Kingdome both want the tournaments in the future. The cost comparison is a tradeoff, according to Colbrese.

Last year, the tournaments had to move because the old coliseum was being remodeled into the KeyArena.

Evergreen has played in all three places in the last three years, winning the championship in the Kingdome.

“It’s a lot more comfortable - homey, or something - than the Coliseum,” Evergreen coach John Triplett said. “And the game’s a lot closer to the fans. The Coliseum seemed so open, so spacious.”

Futility

Decatur’s 69-67 first-round victory over Franklin in the boys nightcap ended two streaks.

Franklin had won the State AA title the last two years. Before Decatur’s victory, the West-Central District (District 3) had lost 15 straight first-round games.

District 3 is the largest in the state and gets six berths in the tournament. After a second-game win by Bellarmine in 1994, D-3 went 0-4, then got blanked six times last year and lost its first five this year.

No hope

Eastside fans are wondering when the combination of the Greater Spokane League and Big Nine will return to four berths in the state tournament instead of the three it was cut back to last year.

Don’t expect any changes soon. The berths are based only on numbers, the number of schools in the classification (District 3 has 32 schools) and the number of students in those schools.

Fans were hoping new schools in Kennewick and Mead, plus the addition of East Valley of Spokane to the GSL, would push the east back to four. However, by the time those schools join the fray, many more Westside schools will be jumping from AA to AAA, including Gig Harbor, Penninsula and Tahoma in District 3.

Double dribbles

Decatur’s two-point win over Franklin wasn’t the only squeaker in the boys tournament Wednesday. A referee, getting ready to go on the floor for Evergreen’s game, stepped on a mouse. … Eisenhower’s 93 points was nine shy of breaking the mark of 101 set by Mercer Island in 1991.

, DataTimes