7A
Friday, January 3, 2020
The Observer
106th Rose Bowl
Prep hoops roundup
LHS girls topple
Yamhill-Carlton,
win fifth straight
Photo by Mark J. Terrill/The Associated Press
Oregon quarterback Justin Herbert runs for a touchdown past Wisconsin linebacker Jack Sanborn Wednesday
during the second half of the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California.
Ducks outlast Wisconsin for thrilling
Rose Bowl victory
By Greg Beacham
The Associated Press
PASADENA, California — Justin
Herbert faked a handoff and went on
the run of his life in the fourth quarter
of the Rose Bowl.
Oregon’s 6-foot-6 quarterback grace-
fully stiff-armed Wisconsin linebacker
Jack Sanborn at the line of scrimmage.
He surged downfield, found his blockers
and sprinted to the green-painted end
zone, even absorbing a very late hit from
the frustrated Badgers as a reward.
The Eugene kid who took over his
beloved hometown team during its worst
season of this century had just scored the
decisive touchdown of the biggest win of
his career. A few minutes and a couple of
big passes later, the Ducks all celebrated
amid confetti and roses at midfield after
Herbert’s final college game.
“I wish it wasn’t over,” Herbert said.
“This has been the best four years of
my life. I’ve been honored to be a part of
this team.”
Herbert scored his third rushing
touchdown of the 106th Rose Bowl on
that thrilling 30-yard run with 7:41 to
play Wednesday night, and No. 7 Or-
egon held off No. 11 Wisconsin 28-27 to
win its third straight trip to the Grand-
daddy of Them All.
Herbert passed for just 138 yards
without a touchdown, and Oregon (12-
2) managed just 204 yards of offense
— the fewest by any Rose Bowl team
in 40 years. The Ducks still managed to
win yet another frenetic edition of this
venerated bowl game, surviving six lead
changes and big special-teams mistakes
by both schools.
While the offense sputtered, the
Ducks scored 21 points off the Bad-
gers’ four turnovers, including Brady
Breeze’s early 31-yard fumble return for
a TD off a botched punt.
And on the next snap after Breeze
forced another fumble in the fourth
quarter, Herbert rambled through the
Wisconsin defense for that 30-yard
score in what’s sure to be the signature
moment of the four-year starter’s career.
“I’m going to be honest with you,
we’ve been telling him to run all year,”
Oregon linebacker La’Mar Winston Jr.
said. “He runs in practice and torches,
so I told him, ‘Man, pull that thing and
get loose.’ Stiff-arming dudes. Juking
dudes. Is he a running back or a quar-
terback? We don’t know.”
Winston’s praise aside, Herbert had
only 10 rushing touchdowns in the first
41 starts of his career. He turned into
a big-play ball-carrier on Arroyo Seco’s
hallowed ground, and Oregon improb-
ably relied on its quarterback’s long legs
to grind out a landmark victory under
second-year head coach Mario Cristob-
al, Herbert’s third coach in four years.
Herbert scored on runs of 4 and 5
yards in the first half, stiff-arming
Wisconsin defenders on both runs. After
his go-ahead TD, Herbert got back to
what he normally does best: He made
a key 12-yard throw to Mycah Pittman
for a first down with 1:51 to play, and
his 28-yard throw to Juwan Johnson
with 1:03 left allowed the Ducks to run
out the clock.
“We knew coming in that he was
athletic,” Sanborn said. “We didn’t have
good angles and miscommunications.
Something we have to be better at in a
game like this. It’s not the first game he
ran with the ball.”
Three years after coach Mark Hel-
frich was fired when the Ducks went
4-8 in Herbert’s freshman season, Or-
egon held on to cap a Pac-12 champion-
ship campaign with its 12th win in 13
games and the fourth Rose Bowl victory
in school history.
“To realize where we were, and where
we are now, it’s been a great journey,”
Herbert said. “For us to stick together
through those tough times is just a tes-
tament to all the guys on the team, and
all the hard work we’ve put in.”
Aron Cruickshank returned an early
kickoff 95 yards for a touchdown for
the Big Ten runner-up Badgers (10-4),
but they lost in their fourth consecutive
trip to Pasadena over the last 10 years,
including two losses to Oregon.
Jonathan Taylor rushed for 94 yards
and Quintez Cephus caught seven
passes for 59 yards and a score, but
Wisconsin quarterback Jack Coan’s
offense couldn’t capitalize on its whop-
ping advantages in time of possession
(38:03-21:57) and total yards (322-204).
“There’s a slim chance you could win,
but it definitely puts you in a tough posi-
tion when you have self-inflected penal-
ties, special teams problems, turnovers,”
said Taylor, who is likely headed to the
NFL. “When you’re playing an elite
team like Oregon, a great team like that,
they’ll capitalize on those mistakes.”
BIG RETURN
Herbert scored his first TD on the
Ducks’ drive from the kickoff in 68-de-
gree temperatures on another postcard-
perfect New Year’s Day in Pasadena,
but Cruickshank took the ensuing kick
straight down the Oregon sideline for
an electrifying score and a rarity in the
Rose Bowl.
The kickoff return was just the second
for a touchdown in Wisconsin’s lengthy
bowl history, but just the third in 106
Rose Bowls — and the first in 17 years.
BOTCHED PUNT
Oregon got a break right after half-
time when Wisconsin punter Anthony
Lotti caught the snap, but dropped the
ball on the ground instead of kicking it
under pressure. Breeze alertly picked it
up and sprinted for the go-ahead score.
The Badgers responded with a drive
capped by Mason Stokke’s 2-yard scor-
ing run, and they went up 27-21 on a
field goal with 12:09 to play.
But Breeze forced another fumble by
Wisconsin’s Danny Davis with a big hit,
and Herbert took the next snap on his
30-yard TD run.
Sen. Hansell takes in Rose Bowl win
By Ronald Bond
The Observer
LA GRANDE — Among
the tens of thousands of
Duck fans in attendance
Wednesday to witness
Oregon’s thrilling 28-27 Rose
Bowl victory over Wisconsin
in Pasadena, California,
was state Sen. Bill Hansell
of Athena, a 1967 Oregon
graduate who was taking in
his fifth Rose Bowl wit-
nessed the Ducks win for the
third time.
“The thing that made this
so unique is it was so close,”
Hansell said of the Ducks’
one-point victory, the closest
in a Rose Bowl Game since
Texas’ 38-37 victory over
Michigan in the 2005 edition
of the “Granddaddy of Them
All.” One has to go back to
1980 to find the last one-
point Rose Bowl prior to that
(USC 17, Ohio State 16).
“I haven’t really thought
about which is more special,”
he said about how the 2020
game stacked up with being in
Pasadena for Oregon’s 45-38
win over Wisconsin in 2012
or the 59-20 win over Florida
State in 2015.
Hansell attended this year’s
game with his son and a
granddaughter, whom he said
was witnessing a Rose Bowl
for the first time in person.
“What I told her is I’ve
been to these games when
we’ve won, been when we’ve
lost and it’s a whole lot more
fun when we win,” Hansell
said.
Hansell and the other
Oregon fans in attendance
— and the team — walked
away as victors after Justin
Herbert’s 30-yard touchdown
run — his third of the game
— gave Oregon the lead for
good with 7:41 to go.
“Our whole part of the
stadium just erupted,” Han-
sell said. “I thought he had
handed the ball off first. Next
thing we know the crowd is
cheering and he’s headed to
the end zone. He had run
so infrequently during the
season, I thought it was
interesting (that he rushed
for three TDs). I heard (in)
one interview that he (runs)
all the time during practice.
They just hadn’t used him
this way.”
While its the third win in
the Rose Bowl for Oregon in
See Hansell / Page 8A
Submitted photo by Suzie Collman
La Grande’s Ella Dunlap is shown last week in a game
against Molalla. The Tigers ran over Yamhill-Carlton
Thursday, 58-30.
Observer staff
Ella Dunlap scored a
game-high 19 points Thurs-
day as the La Grande Tigers
opened the Banks Winter
Shootout by throttling
Yamhill-Carlton, 58-30.
La Grande broke the
game open in the second
quarter, pouring in 21
points to race out to a 34-15
lead at the half, and pushed
the margin to 28 at 48-20
after three quarters.
Camryn Collman added
11 points and Lauran
Rinker added eight for the
Tigers, who won their fifth
game in a row.
La Grande (7-3 overall)
faces undefeated Clats-
kanie, the defending 3A
state champions, Friday in
the tournament semifinals.
Also Thursday
UNION TAKES DOWN
TOLEDO
Callie Glenn scored a
game-high 16 points Thurs-
day, and the Union Bobcats
used a 14-3 second-quarter
run to build a double-digit
lead they wouldn’t relin-
quish on the way to a 45-19
win over Toledo in their
first game at the Toledo
Holiday Tournament.
Brianna Kohr added 14
points for Union, which
won its third game in a
row. The second-quarter
push gave the Bobcats a
24-10 halftime lead, which
reached 39-16 through
three quarters.
Union (9-2 overall) faces
Knappa Friday in the tour-
nament semifinals.
EAGLES DROP THIRD IN
A ROW
Sabrina Albee and
Madelyn Nelson combined
for 26 points Thursday,
but the rest of the Joseph
Eagles scored only four
points as they fell to the
Crane Mustangs, 54-30, in a
contest in Pendleton.
Albee scored 16 points to
lead Joseph, including 11 in
the second half. Nelson had
eight of her 10 points in the
first half for the Eagles.
Joseph (7-4 overall)
plays in Pendleton again
Saturday, this time against
Country Christian.
Boys
EAGLES SPRINT PAST
CRANE
Mason Ferre scored 20
points Thursday, Chase
Murray added 19, and the
Joseph Eagles ran over
the Crane Mustangs in
a matchup in Pendleton,
72-39.
Carson Littlepage added
14 points for the Eagles,
who broke the game open
early and never looked
back. Joseph held a com-
manding 38-12 lead at
the half, then pushed the
margin to 62-21 after three
as it cruised to its third win
in a row and sixth in the
last seven games.
Joseph (8-3 overall) faces
Country Christian Satur-
day in Pendleton.
TOLEDO DRUBS UNION
The host Toledo Boomers
ran away from the Union
Bobcats Thursday at the To-
ledo Holiday Tournament,
rolling to an 81-36 victory.
Stats were not available.
Union (7-4 overall) faces
Illinois Valley Friday in the
tournament’s consolation
semifinals.
Ducks, Beavs fall
in Pac-12 openers
The Associated Press
BOULDER, Colorado —
McKinley Wright IV scored
11 of his 21 points in the fi-
nal 5 minutes,
Men’s and Colorado
another
college beat
ranked team,
hoops taking down
No. 4 Oregon
74-65 on Thursday night.
Tyler Bey added 15
points and grabbed 14
rebounds as the Buffaloes
(12-2, 1-0 Pac-12) improved
to 9-0 all-time against the
Ducks (11-3, 0-1) in Boulder.
Colorado also moved to
2-1 against ranked teams
this season. The Buffaloes
are 19-32 under coach Tad
Boyle versus teams in the
AP Top 25 since he took
over in 2010-11. He ac-
counts for 30% of Colorado’s
63 wins over ranked op-
ponents since 1949-50.
This was a matchup
between the teams picked
to finish first (Oregon) and
second (Colorado) in the
See Hoops / Page 8A