SPORTS
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2016
1B
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PENDLETON
Prep Football
T-Wolves take care of business Mustangs
meet Tigers
for CBC title
Blue Mountain
wins in three over
Wenatchee Valley
By ERIC SINGER
East Oregonian
With a little more than two
weeks left in the regular season,
every match is crucial for the
Blue Mountain Timberwolves.
Going into Wednesday
night’s game, the Timberwolves
— the four-time defending
NWAC champions — held
only a two-and-a-half game
cushion for
the fourth and
Volleyball
fi nal playoff
berth in the
East division,
and need all Wenatchee
the wins they
can get to keep
the cushion
beneath them.
After roughly
90 minutes of Blue Mountain
game action
on Wednesday
evening, the
Timberwolves were able to
take care of the business they
needed, sweeping Wenatchee
Valley 25-16, 25-14, 25-18 at
Mosby Court.
“It felt really good,” said
Blue Mountain freshman
Shelby Schreier. “We had a lot
of energy on the court and just
had fun playing.”
Blue Mountain (17-14, 6-4
NWAC East) co-head coach
Jessica Humphreys echoed the
statement.
“It just seemed like the
team was relaxed and having
fun tonight and I think that
was a big part of the success,”
Humphreys said.
Sophomore Miah Perez
led the team with 11 kills as
her Timberwolves out-hit
Wenatchee Valley (9-21, 4-7)
39-23 in the game. Kristin
Williams, Shelby Schreier,
Jordan Mix, and Brooke
Lomica tallied six kills apiece
to help pace the T-Wolves.
“We identifi ed some spots
that were open in (the Knights)
defense,” Schreier said of the
T-Wolves’ success. Their block
would give us a lot of lines and
we’d go for that ... make them
move around and just hit the
ball as hard as we could.”
The Blue Mountain front
line had a strong game overall,
aside from just the kills, regis-
tering a total of 12 blocked hits,
led by Lomica with four and
both Schreier and Williams
Postseason scenarios
dwindling for local squads
By MATT ENTRUP
East Oregonian
One of the football season’s biggest ques-
tions will fi nally be answered in Week 8 when
the Heppner Mustangs host the Stanfi eld Tigers
on Friday to determine the Columbia Basin
Conference champion.
At the beginning of the season Mustangs
coach Greg Grant said Stanfi eld’s nine returning
all-conference players had to make them the
favorite to win their fi rst CBC title.
Meanwhile, Stanfi eld coach Davy Salas
pointed to Heppner’s 18 league titles in the last
two decades as reasons the Mustangs remained
the team to beat.
Neither team has done anything to make
either coach change their tune heading into
Friday’s 7 p.m. kick-off at Morrow County
Fairgrounds.
The defending state champions clearly aren’t
the same senior-heavy team that steamrolled
the Tigers 60-6 in Stanfi eld last season, but the
Mustangs’ starting defense has only allowed six
points in three league wins, and Heppner (6-1,
3-0 CBC) suffered its only loss to Washington
1A Cascade.
Leading Class 2A’s second-ranked defen-
sive unit is Heppner senior Kevin Murray with
0
3
See PREP FOOTBALL/2B
Staff photo by Kathy Aney
BMCC’s Brooke Lomica (6) and Shelby Schreier (15) block the hit of Kendra Wallin, of
Wenatchee Valley College Wednesday at the McCrae Activity Center in Pendleton.
Staff photo by Kathy Aney
BMCC’s Kailey Buckner (5) and Shelby Schreier (15) slap
hands after scoring a point during Wednesday’s game
against Wenatchee Valley College in Pendleton.
with three apiece.
“Yeah
our
blocking
game was on point tonight,”
Humphreys said. “We did work
on that this week in practice so
it was nice to see them transfer
that to the game.”
Humphreys added that
freshman Anjoilyn Vreeland
caught her eye in the game, as
Vreeland stepped in at libero for
Bailey Tillotson who missed the
game with an illness. Vreeland
led the team with 13 digs and
added a serving ace as well.
“She’s been playing really
well in practice and it was an
opportunity to give (Bailey)
a bit of a rest,” Humphreys
said. “We always keep things
competitive in practice, incen-
tivize the girls to continue to
push each other and play hard
and everybody fi nds a way on
the court that way.”
Wenatchee Valley never held
a lead at any point of the night,
with Blue Mountain winning
the fi rst point of each set. There
was only one tie in the match as
well, when the teams were split
1-1 through the fi rst two points
of the fi rst set. In each set, Blue
Mountain took some time to
settle in, although they did fend
off a few feverish runs by the
Knights, as well.
See T-WOLVES/2B
Staff photo by E.J. Harris/fi le
In this Oct. 16, 2015, fi le photo, Heppner’s
Logan Grieb goes for the catch defended
by Stanfi eld’s Justin Keeney in the Mus-
tangs’ 60-6 win in Stanfi eld.
ALCS
Cleveland reaches World Series on Merritt
Rookie pitcher
delivers with five
scoreless innings
By NOAH TRISTER
Associated Press
TORONTO — For the
Cleveland Indians, the script
was the same every game
— hope for the best from
whoever they started, then
count on Andrew Miller and
the bullpen to close it out.
That plan seemed espe-
cially dicey in
T h e
Game 5
24-year-old
Game 5 of the
lefty defi ed
AL Champi-
expectations,
onship Series,
shutting
with lightly
Cleveland
Toronto
down
the
used
Ryan
powerful
Merritt on the
Blue
Jays
mound.
But out of nowhere, the before exiting in the fi fth
inning. Thanks to a most
rookie delivered.
Merritt coolly kept the unlikely pitching perfor-
Indians ahead until reinforce- mance, a most unexpected
ments arrived, and Cleveland team won the ALCS 4-1.
Cleveland, which has
earned its fi rst trip to the
World Series since 1997 by never hosted a World Series
blanking the Toronto Blue opener, will play Game 1 at
Progressive Field on Tuesday
Jays 3-0 Wednesday.
3
0
night against the Chicago
Cubs or Los Angeles
Dodgers.
Manager Terry Franco-
na’s team will try to augment
what’s already been a scin-
tillating year in Cleveland
after LeBron James and the
Cavaliers earned the city’s
fi rst major pro sports cham-
pionship since 1964.
The Indians’ title drought
dates to 1948. In 1997, they
let a one-run lead get away
in the bottom of the ninth
inning in Game 7 and lost
See ALCS/2B
Mark Blinch/The Canadian Press via AP
Cleveland Indians fi rst baseman Carlos Santana cele-
brates after the Indians defeated the Toronto Blue Jays
3-0 in Game 5 of the baseball American League Cham-
pionship Series in Toronto on Wednesday, Oct. 19, 2016.
Sports shorts
Rose cleared of charges by jury
Davis pushes for move to Vegas
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Jurors cleared
NBA star Derrick Rose and two friends
Wednesday in a lawsuit that accused them of
gang raping his ex-girlfriend when she was
incapacitated from drugs or alcohol.
The jury reached the verdict in
federal court in Los Angeles after
hearing dramatically different
accounts of the August 2013
sexual encounter.
Neither side denied the three
men had sex with the woman,
but the issue was whether she
Rose
consented or was too intoxicated
to do so.
Defense lawyers tarred the woman as a liar
who tried to sway jurors through her tears to
get at Rose’s fortune. They claimed she was
angry he had dumped her and she set him
up and brought the lawsuit in hopes of a big
payoff.
HOUSTON (AP) — His eyes on Las Vegas,
Raiders owner Mark Davis says he hasn’t shut
the door on anything. Oakland, though, might
have shut the door on itself as
home for his team.
“Oakland was in the driver’s
seat if they could’ve put together
anything,” Davis said Wednesday
at the NFL’s fall meetings, after
updating his fellow owners on
his desire to relocate to the gambling capital.
“They came up with nothing.
“Las Vegas has already done what it is
supposed to do and we have to bring it up to the
National Football League and get permission to
move to Las Vegas.”
Several owners insisted it’s far too early to
reach any conclusions in the Raiders’ reloca-
tion issue, and none of them wanted to touch
the relationship an NFL team might have with
a casino mogul.
“The fi rst half was
abominable. It was like
a Donald Trump debate
performance out there.”
— Rick Carlisle
Dallas Mavericks coach on his
team’s play during an 106-91
loss to Indiana in a NBA presea-
son game on Wednesday. Dallas
trailed 47-38 at halftime.
THIS DATE IN SPORTS
1990 — The Cincinnati
Reds complete one of the
biggest upsets in baseball
history, beating the Oakland
Athletics 2-1 to win the World
Series in four games.
2002 — Marshall Faulk
rushes for 183 yards in the
Rams 37-20 win over Seattle,
becoming the 15th NFL player
to gain 10,000 yards rushing.
2004 — Just three outs
from getting swept in the
ALCS three nights earlier,
the Boston Red Sox beat the
New York Yankees, winning
Game 7 in a 10-3 shocker
to become the fi rst major
league team to overcome a
3-0 postseason series defi cit.
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