PAGE A12, KEIZERTIMES, JUNE 17, 2016
KEIZERTIMES.COM
Volcanoes start 20th season Friday at home
By TIM HAYS
Of the Keizertimes
The Salem-Keizer Volcanoes
baseball players arrived into town on
Sunday, June 12, and are opening up
their fi rst series this weekend against
the Hillsboro Hops.
With seven returning players,
highlighted by pitcher Mac Marshall,
the No. 25 prospect in the San Fran-
cisco Giants organization and fi rst
baseman Chase Compton, the Volca-
noes have a slew of youngsters com-
ing in from all over the country, and
other parts of the world.
“We’re trying to get better men-
tally and physically as a player and
just having fun,” Compton said.
“We are just trying to get a ring
up there.”
The Volcanoes are entering their
20th season and have made renova-
tions to the stadium in hopes for an
exciting year.
They added a digital scoreboard in
right fi eld, a family zone down the
right fi eld line, and cameras around
the ballpark, which will allow them
to broadcast their games around the
Salem-Keizer area.
Even a special ceremony has been
prepared for opening night on Friday.
“We will be reenacting the Open-
ing Day Ceremonies from 20 years
ago which will include an eloquent
speech and a ceremonial fi rst pitch
from those who were infl uential in
bringing baseball to Salem-Keizer,”
said owner Jerry Walker.
“So much has changed and fans
will be amazed at the changes but
will see the one constant over the
years - baseball.”
Opening night will be the fi rst of
nine Friday fi rework shows this sea-
son.
All three games against Hillsboro
start at 6:35 p.m.
Salem-Keizer will then travel to
Boise Monday but return home
Thursday, June 23 for fi ve games
against Tri-City.
The Volcanoes are a short-season
A affi liate of the San Francisco Gi-
ants.
Gym’s open for the summer
KEIZERTIMES/Derek Wiley
KEIZERTIMES/Derek Wiley
Abbey Hawley leads a fast break during a McNary girls basketball practice last week. The rising
sophomore made a game-tying 3-pointer Monday against Cascade.
Cade Goff, an incoming senior, works on a post drill with McNary boys basketball coach Ryan
Kirch at practice Monday.
Lady Celts look for identity
By DEREK WILEY
Of the Keizertimes
The result of Monday’s
scrimmage, a 44-41 over-
time win over Cascade, wasn’t
nearly as important as who
was on the court for McNary.
For just the third time in
eight summer games, the Lady
Celts had their whole team
together.
“Even as coaches, we don’t
know exactly what to expect
at this point,” McNary head
coach Derick Handley said.
“We know we have athletes.
We know we have talent but
we don’t know what it looks
like together. For these last
few games, that’s what we’re
hoping for is we can form that
identity of what we are going
to be next year.”
Standardized testing and
sibling graduations have kept
girls away.
McNary played at a tour-
nament in Eugene Saturday
without three potential start-
ers—Sydney Hunter, Gabby
Schmidt and Abbey Hawley,
who returned Monday to tie
the game against Cascade on
a 3-pointer with 4 seconds re-
maining in regulation.
Saturday, the Lady Celts
defeated North Eugene 39-28
before falling to Sheldon and
Lake Oswego.
“We played with six. We
stayed out of foul trouble,”
Handley said. “We were com-
petitive, even missing some of
our top players. I think we ran
out of gas. We had a hard time
adjusting. With a lot of youth
and a lot on inexperience. We
couldn’t adjust mid-game like
we typically can.”
The absence of some of
McNary’s top players has giv-
en other girls the opportunity
to shine and two young Lady
Celts, rising junior Alayna
Grier and upcoming sopho-
more Caiya Ewert, have im-
pressed coaches.
“That’s actually been one
of the nice surprises this sum-
mer is that we’ve had two kids
really stand out who we didn’t
know if they’d be a varsity
player or not, that are prov-
ing that they can,” Handley
said. “Both this weekend were
thrown into starting positions
and they’d never played a sec-
ond of varsity in their life and
not only held their own but
were really intelligent and did
a lot, great rebounding, good
defense, just those little role
pieces that we’ll defi nitely
need if we’re going to be suc-
cessful next year.”
With the graduation of
Madi Hingston, Reina Strand
and Kaelia Flores, who have
all signed to play Division II
college basketball, Handley is
looking for leadership.
“We’re still sloppy and you
can tell we lost our leadership,
at least some of our leader-
ship,” he said.
Please see GIRLS, Page 13
Celtics evaluating talent
By DEREK WILEY
Of the Keizertimes
With only two weeks of
practice in November before
the season tips off, McNary
boys basketball coach Ryan
Kirch makes sure to get the
most out of the summer.
And this year is no differ-
ent.
“There’s not a lot of time
to waste and we want to make
sure we’ve got a pretty good
idea of where we’re at and
what we need to focus on,”
Kirch said. “It’s really a evalua-
tion period for us.”
The Celtics, who are play-
ing around 20 games during
the month of June, traveled
to McMinnville for a tourna-
ment Saturday and Sunday. Af-
ter defeating the host school,
Silverton and then Sprague,
McNary lost to Wilsonville in
the tournament’s champion-
ship game.
“It’s pretty convenient and
relatively close,” Kirch said
of the tournament. “It’s good
competition. We get some
Portland schools to come
down. It’s a good tourna-
ment.”
The Celtics opened sum-
mer league on June 4-5 with
a tournament at Willamette
University.
McNary is 8-2 in its fi rst
10 games as they look to re-
place Greater Valley Confer-
ence Player of the Year Harry
Cavell and Trent Van Cleave,
a three-year starter at point
guard.
“We’re going to be a little
bit different than last year,”
Kirch said. “Right now we
pass the ball pretty well but
we’ve got to get better defen-
sively. But that’s always sort of
the case in the summertime.
The biggest thing for us is we
can see the areas we need to
focus on in the fall. Our kids
are competing and we have
some talented kids. It’s just a
matter of putting them in the
right position to be successful.
Again, expose our weaknesses
a little bit in the summertime
and recognize where we’ve
got to improve.”
Along with practice on
Monday, the varsity team plays
on Tuesday nights, the junior
varsity on Wednesday and the
freshmen squad on Thursdays.
This weekend, all three
teams are playing in a tourna-
ment in Wilsonville.
“We have young kids com-
ing up from the lower levels,”
Kirch said.
“Guys are going to be
asked to do different things
and see how the pieces fall. At
all levels, it’s an evaluation of
talent both individually and
then we’ll see the strength
and weaknesses as a team. We
tried to install some stuff that
we want with our personnel
coming back that we know
we’ll have next year.”
Please see BOYS, Page 13
Duran hurdles way to Oregon State
By DEREK WILEY
Of the Keizertimes
Running track in college
was so far off Dani Duran’s ra-
dar that she hadn’t even taken
the SAT or ACT.
The McNary senior had
planned to go to Chemeketa
Community College, which
doesn’t require either tests.
However, Duran’s future
changed on April 13 after she
convinced her coaches to let
her try the 300-meter hurdles
midway through her fi nal high
school season.
“I just wanted to try it,”
Duran said.
“I never thought I would
be good at it. I just wanted to
try it to do something differ-
ent.”
Without really any practice
or training, Duran clocked
the fourth best time in the
state—46.75.
Three days later, she moved
up to third (45.80) and then
set a new school record
(44.91) while also winning
the Greater Valley Conference
title.
Her goal became to win a
state championship and while
she came up just short, placing
second in 44.37 behind Leah
Russell of Gresham, her strong
fi nish gave her a new oppor-
tunity.
Kelly Sullivan, the head
track and fi eld coach at Or-
egon State University, was
watching.
“After I got second, I was
really bummed and upset but
he came up to me and intro-
duced himself and gave me
a card and told me to email
him,” Duran said.
She did, which resulted in
Duran visiting the campus and
receiving an offer to join the
team.
If Duran, a 3.5 student, can’t
take the ACT in time, she said
she’ll enroll at Chemeketa for
a term and then transfer to
OSU.
When Duran fi rst pictured
herself as a college athlete
years ago, she saw herself not
on the track but as a gym-
nast—the sport that she has
done since she was 4 years old.
“I’ve always wanted to go
to college for sports,” Duran
said. “That was my goal. OSU
has always been my top col-
lege.”
Duran didn’t do track until
high school when her fresh-
man health teacher Dustin
Walker, who is also the pole
vault coach, talked her into
giving it a try.
She ran the 200, 400, 4x100
and 4x400, also winning the
GVC in the 400 this season.
“Dani Duran has been a
leader by example,” McNary
head track and fi eld coach
Frank Gauntz said. “Her work
ethic and competitive nature
has only helped our track
team the last four years. Dani
is a really special person and
athlete.”
Please see DURAN, Page 13
File
Dani Duran fi nished second in the state in the 300-meter hur-
dles, which caught the attention of the OSU track team.