Sparts hang tough, but Vikings take over in fourth quarter.

SEATTLE – With their season ended before the state tournament once again, the Bainbridge girls basketball team quietly gathered their gym bags and headed out the door.

The Spartans fought hard in an up and down game in the first three quarters, but couldn’t hang on in the fourth, falling 54-40 to Rainier Beach Tuesday in a loser-out game in the 3A Sea-King district tournament at Ingraham High School.

“It’s just a tough loss,” a tearful Caitlyn Salo said afterward.

Bainbridge got off to a good start as they took an 8-4 lead early in the first quarter.

Brittany Gray scored three points while Salo added a bucket and Emily Farrar nailed a three-pointer.

Tireion Turner scored five points in a scoring burst to put the Vikings up by one, but Bainbridge went on a 9-2 run to take the lead at the end of the quarter.

Salo had five points, including a three-point play while Farrar banked in a shot near the baseline and Gray scored again just as the buzzer went off for the 17-11 lead.

The Spartans built the lead up to 19-11 as Kirsten Michael banked in a jumper, but Turner and Brittany Nabors scored to close the lead to four with 6:16 left until the half.

Farrar and Nabors then traded threes while Julia Weese split a pair of free throws.

Turner dropped in two more while Anna Wood split another pair of free throws at the 4:32 mark.

That was the last point for the rest of the quarter as both teams clanked shot after shot off the rim.

Lindsay Bratonia finally ended the scoring drought when she split a pair of free throws with 11 seconds left, sending Bainbridge into the locker room with a five point lead.

“We played a really good first half,” head coach Penny Gienger said. “I thought we played really well.”

But the Vikings came out in the second half and used their speed to take advantage of some bad passes by the Spartans.

On the inbounds play to open the third quarter, Nabors stole the ball and raced down the court for the layin.

That sparked a 9-0 run as Nabors scored inside again while Turner scored three points and Ronnie Palmer connected on two free throws to put Beach up by four.

Gray scored in the paint to stop the bleeding, but Nabors reopened the wound with three more points to increase the Vikings’ lead to five.

Gienger said their poor passing hurt them in the end.

“We telegraphed our passes a lot,” she said. “We knew exactly who we were passing it to and we weren’t very creative in that instance.”

Bainbridge fought back with a 5-0 run to tie the game at 32.

Wood scored on a short jumper, then Michael scored on the inside as Salo slipped while she was driving to the hoop, but made the pass for the score.

The fourth was all Beach, as Salo scored four points to put the Spartans up by two, but Nabors drilled a three and the Vikings took off with a 14-0 run to put the game away.

Despite the hard loss, Salo felt they still had a great year with all they had to overcome.

“We had Megan (Burris) out which is a big part of our team so I think we could have done a lot better if she was still healthy,” she said.

Salo led the team with 12 points.

Gray had just seven points, but grabbed 14 rebounds while Farrar had eight points.

The Spartans outrebounded the Vikings 40-28 but committed 22 turnovers to Beach’s 12.

Bainbridge finished with a season record of 14-12