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SPORTS Saturday, January 9, 2016 East Oregonian Page 3B BOARDMAN NBA Thompson leads Warriors over Blazers Riverside wrestlers Golden State Warriors guard Klay Thompson (11) hits a 3-point shot over Portland Trail Blazers guard C.J. McCollum during the second half of an NBA basketball game in Portland, Ore., Friday, Jan. 8, 2016. The Warriors won 128-108. By ANNE M. PETERSON Associated Press PORTLAND — Klay Thompson scored 36 points, making seven 3-pointers, and the Golden State Warriors beat the Portland Trail Blazers 128-108 on Friday night for their ¿fth straight victory. Reigning league MVP Stephen Curry added 26 points and nine assists in three quarters for the Warriors (34-2), who led by as many as 25 Golden State points and made 18 3-pointers. Draymond G r e e n Portland finished with 11 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists for his eighth triple-double of the season. Curry started despite continued soreness from a bruised left shin that kept him out of a pair of games late last month. He aggravated the injury again when he crashed into Roy Hibbert on Tuesday night and sat out the fourth quarter of Golden State’s 109-98 victory at the Los Angeles Lakers. Damian Lillard had a season-high 40 points and 10 assists for Portland, which dropped its third straight. The Warriors remained unbeaten since a 114-91 defeat at Dallas on Dec. 30. Portland was coming off a 109-98 loss at home to the Los Angeles Clippers on Wednesday. The loss was notable because starter CJ McCollum was mistakenly 128 AP Photo/Steve Dykes ZLQ¿YHGXDOV East Oregonian The Riverside wrestlers overcame some roster shortcomings to take all ¿ve of their duals on Friday in their warm-up for today’s Riverside Rumble tourna- ment. The Pirates, which had several wrestlers moving up a weight class to ¿ll vacancies, earned wins over Grant Union, 45-36, Herm- iston ‘C’, 48-24, Heppner, 38-24, Elgin, 46-18, and Imbler, 60-6. Riverside coach Richard Rockwell said match against Grant Union came 108 down a pair of key wins by 170-pounder Jason Navarro and 220-pounder Anthony Kernal. Five Pirates ¿nished 5-0 on the day: Gabriel Romero (113), Andrew Barker (120), Sylvestre Vasquez (132) and A.J. Rockwell (138). Going 4-1 for Riverside were: Christian Reyes (126), Ulises Calvillo (145) and Ivan Escobedo (152). Navarro and Zach Ferguson (182) went 3-2 while Kernal ¿nished 2-2 in what Coach Rockwell said was easily the toughest weight class of the day. Irrigon’s Fredy Vera lays the ball in guarded by Hep- pner’s Weston Putman in the Mus- tangs’ 44-42 win against the Knights on Friday in Irri- gon. left off the active roster turned in before the game and was forced to sit out. The Warriors jumped out to a 12-2 lead at the start while Portland missed its ¿rst nine shots from the ¿eld. There was a brief tense moment when Curry collided with Noah Vonleh and came up gingerly. Green’s fast-break dunk put the Warriors up 24-9 and Thompson had ¿ve Staff photo by E.J. Harris 3-pointers and 19 points in the opening quarter as Golden State led 38-21. It was Thompson’s third straight game with 30 or more points. Rush had a season- high 20 points. MUSTANGS: Knights Lynch ruled out, doesn’t travel to Minnesota pull trigger too soon on Seahawks are likely to rely attempt to get ¿nal shot on the combo of Christine By TIM BOOTH Associated Press RENTON, Wash. — Seattle Seahawks running back Marshawn Lynch has been ruled out of the NFC wild-card game against Minnesota. The Seahawks released a statement late Friday saying Lynch did not make the trip for the Sunday game. The statement from the team capped a day where Lynch’s status changed three times. Coach Pete Carroll indicated on KIRO-FM on Friday morning that Lynch would play, then after prac- tice in the afternoon said that Lynch was questionable and the team needed to evaluate him again before deciding if he would play against the Vikings. “I have not said yet that he’s playing. I know that’s been out there. We don’t know for sure until we ¿nish the week. He’s looked really good,” Carroll said after the ¿nal practice of the week and before the team departed for Minnesota. AP Photo/Ted S. Warren Seattle Seahawks running back Marshawn Lynch holds a candy cane in his mouth as he warms up be- fore NFL football practice, Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2016, in Renton, Wash. Lynch has been recovering since having abdominal surgery last November. Lynch was listed as a full participant in practice all three days this week after not playing since Week 10 against Arizona. Lynch had abdominal surgery Nov. 25 and rejoined the team this week after spending most of his recovery in the Bay Area working out with personal trainers. “We’ve got to go to tomorrow and make sure he’s OK after today,” Carroll said. “We’ll do that same old thing and see how he’s taken to the week’s work and all of that. He looked good during the week and did some really good stuff. We’ll just use all of the time that we have available.” With Lynch out the Michael and Bryce Brown, who shared the rushing load the ¿nal three weeks of the regular season. Michael is coming off a career-high 102 yards rushing in the regular season ¿nale against Arizona. Lynch is the second player Seattle has ruled out after previ- ously announcing it would be without tight end Luke Willson after he had a setback in his recovery from a concussion suffered in the Week 16 loss to St. Louis. Willson was a limited participant in practice Wednesday before sitting out the past two days. “He just didn’t quite get through it,” Carroll said. “He did some of the work and practiced with us and just didn’t quite recover. We’re going to take care of him.” Everyone else for Seattle was listed as probable including starting strong safety Kam Chancellor, guard J.R. Sweezy and left tackle Russell Okung after all three missed the regu- lar-season ¿nale. SEAHAWKS: Cold air pumped in during practice Continued from 3B that it’s going to be a cold game.” The Seahawks have never played in temperatures lower than 16 degrees when they visited Denver in 2006. But with temperatures forecast to be around zero in Minneap- olis on Sunday, the Seahawks are preparing for a cold most of them have never experi- enced with no easy way to replicate it other than standing in a storage freezer for an extended period of time. Seattle opened all the doors to its indoor practice facility and pumped in cold air during the week, but even that was mild compared to what they’ll face this weekend. And this is not a group that has extensive experience playing in frigid conditions. Under Pete Carroll, the Seahawks have played only two games in temperatures under 25 degrees. Linebacker Bobby Wagner remembered one game in college at Utah State that was so cold and snowy, players wore plastic bags over their feet to keep the moisture from soaking through their cleats and getting their socks wet. Russell Wilson played his ¿nal year of college ball at Wisconsin and had a few chilly practices inside Camp Randall Stadium. “Once it gets below 20 it’s all about the same,” Wilson said. Even with the freezing conditions don’t expect to see players deviating from what they’ve done in the past. Sleeves? Forget about it if you are one that has traditionally not worn them. When asked why he wouldn’t add arm coverings, linebacker Bruce Irvin joked, “I can’t look like no punk, man.” And that seemed to be the sentiment throughout the Seattle locker room. Fred Jackson, who spent nine seasons in Buffalo, planned to forgo the sleeves. Rookie wide receiver Kasen Williams played the ¿nal regular season college game of his career in 19-degree conditions in kickoff, but still planned to only go with three-quarters sleeves in Minnesota. Some of the reasoning seems to be psychology of trying to keep the chill from getting in their heads. Some of it — especially for ball carriers — is tactical in wanting to feel the ball against their skin rather than having a layer of material in the way. Of course, that’s assuming they’re able to feel their skin in the ¿rst place. “There’s nothing you can do to change what minus 2 or zero feels like. You just got to go out there and play in it,” Jackson said. Richard Sherman down- played the cold because of the advances in technology including massive heaters and heated benches on each sideline. But the idea of trying to tackle Adrian Peterson or Marshawn Lynch in such conditions is not an enviable thought for anyone playing defense. Yet it’s the offensive side where most impacts of the cold are likely to be notice- able especially in the passing game and trying to catch a ball that’s going to feel like a brick. “We’ll see what happens. Unfortunately, that’s some- thing that we can’t control, but we’ve always dealt well with the things we can’t control,” Baldwin said. Continued from 1B the way that they played tonight,” said Heppner coach Jeremy Rosenbalm. “Total team win, and the scoring was pretty balanced and when we can do that we’ll be tough.” Irrigon (8-4, 0-1 CBC) had its opportunity to earn the victory at the end of the game, stalling the game from the 1:18 mark in the fourth quarter all the way to less than 10 seconds remaining to try for the last shot, one which Fredy Vera missed from the right Àat with eight seconds left. Collins then reached for and grabbed the rebound and was fouled on the play, setting up the game-win- ning free throw attempts. Heppner coach Jeremy Rosenbalm said the only thing that surprised him about that series was the amount of time left on the clock. “I am (surprised) because usually when it’s tied you don’t want to give the other team an opportu- nity and they did that and luckily we took advantage,” he said. “With their athletes and quick guards I thought they’d take (the clock) down a little bit further but it worked out for us.” Heppner (11-1, 1-0) appeared to have the advan- tage through the ¿rst half, limiting Irrigon on defense and attacking the basket on offense on its way to a 30-21 lead at halftime. That style also led to a 9-2 foul differential in favor of the Mustangs in the half. However, the Knights came out in the second half with some extra energy and determination and quickly started to whittle away Heppner’s lead. Irrigon coach Mitch Thompson said he told his team at half- time that they just needed to trust the process and themselves, and it showed on the defensive end of the Àoor. “I thought we did a much better job in second half of sitting down and guarding,” Thompson said. Irrigon’s guard duo of Vera and Xavier Rambo began to cause issues for Heppner, as they were slashing to the basket through Heppner’s zone and dishing the ball out to open Knights with relative ease. Vera ¿nished with a team-high 13 points. Irrigon started making its run with 2:30 left in the third quarter, when Austin Rice nailed a 3-pointer followed by a ¿nger-roll lay-in by Rambo to cut the Mustangs’ lead to 35-33. Rambo then ¿nished the quarter off by sinking a short shot at the buzzer to tie the game at 35-35 — the ¿rst tie of the game since it was 6-6 early in the ¿rst quarter, getting the Irrigon fans on their feet. The fourth quarter began with some back- and-forth play, with Irrigon answering each Heppner basket. That is until Hayden White backed down his defender and banked in a short jumper to put the Knights on top for the ¿rst time since holding a 6-4 lead in the ¿rst quarter. But it was short-lived as C.J. Kindle came right down the Àoor and scored on a short shot to tie the game back up at 42-42, which set up the ¿nal series. Kindle was forced to sit out for most of the second half with foul trouble, which was a big hole for Heppner to try and ¿ll on the Àoor. “C.J. has been a four- year starter at point guard, so when he goes out it takes a dimension of our offense away,” said Rosenbalm. Irrigon ¿nished the game leading the foul total 16-5 over Heppner, which affected Irrigon’s tempo and rhythm on offense. After the game, Thompson was clearly not pleased with that fact. “I think a lot of things dictated the pace of play tonight, and that’s what I’m going to say about it,” he said. Heppner hits the court again today to host Stan- ¿eld at 5:30 p.m., while Irrigon will look to rebound today at Weston-McEwen at 5:30 p.m. ——— HHS (11-1) 21 9 5 9 — 44 IHS (8-4) 14 7 14 7 — 42 HEPPNER — P. Collins 12, W. Putman 10, L. Grieb 8, C.J. Kindle 8, C. Hedman 4, K. Murray 2, J. Lindsay, K. Clark. IRRIGON — F. Vera 13, A. Rice 8, H. White 8, X. Rambo 6, D. Vera 5, O. Vera 2, A. Roa, L. Covarrubia, J. Phillips. 3-pointers — HHS 2, IHS 4. Free throws — HHS 10-12, IHS 0-0. Fouls — HHS 5, IHS 16. ——— Contact Eric Singer at esinger@eastoregonian. com, (541) 966-0839, or follow on Twitter @ByEr- icSinger.
