Lake Washington overcame a 20-point halftime deficit to end Sammamish’s season in a 66-64 thriller in the first round of the KingCo 3A league tournament.

The Kang’s, who entered the tournament as KingCo’s No.5 seed, trailed 44-24 at halftime, but outscored Sammamish 42-20 in the second half.

Four different Kang’s scored in double figures in the victory, led by the 19 points of Matt Staudacher. Guy Lynott added 14 points, Kramer Taylor had 12 and Darien Nelson-Henry scored 10 to round out Lake Washington’s double-digit scorers.

Lake Washington (13-8) clinches a district berth with the win and faces No.1 Bellevue (16-4) tomorrow in the tournament semifinals. That game will begin at 6:30 p.m. at Bellevue College.

John Steinberg scored 22 points for Sammamish (13-8) in the loss. George Valle added 17 points.

Bellevue girls bounced by Mercer Island

Mercer Island used a big third quarter to break a back-and-forth game against Bellevue wide open, racing to a 55-40 victory that eliminated the Wolverines.

Jae Shin scored a game-high 21 points and Hailey Gullstad added 14 points for the Islanders (14-8).

The game was deadlocked at 23-23 at the half when Mercer Island went on an 18-8 run that put the Islanders ahead for good.

Natalie Anderson (14 points) and Katie Savard (11 points) led Bellevue (8-13) in the loss.