BELLEVUE — Opponents are starting to learn what the Lake Washington High boys basketball team has had figured for the last several months: It’s just what Dalton Liesse does.

Liesse hit a huge 3-pointer in the closing minute of overtime on Saturday as the Kangaroos rallied for a win over Redmond, 67-63, in the third place game of the Class 3A KingCo Conference tournament at Newport High School.

“That last one, I’m screaming, ‘pull it out and let’s run the clock,’ and he goes ahead and fires it,” Lake Washington coach Ryan Staudacher said. “It’s a good thing he made it. It’s one of those, ‘no, no, yeah’ things. That’s what he does.”

Leisse, apparently, didn’t hear his coach from across the court.

“Just win the game,” the junior wing said of his mindset. “These are my brothers. They work so hard in practice to get me open in the corners, and I just got it and knocked it down. Sam had a great pass for me. He did that all game long.”

Leisse finished with 14 points, including four of seven shooting from long range in the win, which puts the Kangs (11-8) through to the Sea-King District tournament. Lake Washington held Redmond (11-12) to just 11.1 percent in the overtime period and allowed only 26 points after halftime.

The defensive intensity might well have been the Kangs’ lifeline on Thursday, as Lake Washington had scored only two points until sophomore Griffin Barker beat the first-quarter buzzer with a 3-pointer. The Kangs trailed 14-5.

“We had to dig deep,” Staudacher said. “There was a lull in here to begin the game and we didn’t come out as intense as we needed to. Redmond plays so hard; hats off to them. They battle, they’re physical. They always make these dogfight games. We knew that coming in, but we didn’t bring the right intensity and it took us a while to get going. We kept fighting and slowly crawled our way back into it.”

Heimdahl 3 to tie the game at 41-41 after 3 quarters. pic.twitter.com/8XXW4lFwCy

— John William Howard (@JowardHoward) February 10, 2017

Both Linskey and Barker played long portions of the second half with four fouls. Linskey picked up his fourth 80 seconds into the second half — Lake Washington had already been called for four team fouls — and Barker was whistled for an offensive foul midway through the third quarter.

Barker only fouled out in the waning seconds of overtime, after scoring 13 points and grabbing a game-high 13 rebounds.

“We were upset with the officiating, but we had to realize that’s not what determines the game,” Lake Washington senior Sam Linskey said. “We had to turn up the energy and play just as physical as they were, and that got us back in. … Our seniors realized we didn’t want this to be our last game, especially to Redmond. We just turned it on.”

AJ Filan played heavy minutes in Linskey’s absence and scored seven points, including five of six free-throws down the stretch. Beau Heimdahl scored 15 points on four-of-nine shooting from beyond the arc. Linskey led all scorers with 16 points.

Devon LaPierre led Redmond with 14 points and 12 rebounds.

Next, Lake Washington is scheduled to open the Sea-King District tournament with a loser-out game at 7 p.m. on Feb. 11 at Eastside Catholic in Sammamish. The Crusaders (13-9) finished sixth in the Metro League standings.

The Sea-King District tournament includes undefeated Nathan Hale (21-0), regarded as one of the top boys basketball teams in the country.

The top seven teams from the tournament advance to the regional games.

Lake Washington’s Dalton Liesse hit four 3-pointers, including a big shot late in overtime, to help seal the Kangs’ win on Saturday in Bellevue. JOHN WILLIAM HOWARD/Kirkland Reporter