SPORTS
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 2017
1B
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PENDLETON
MLB
Pendleton ends drought
Bucks capture
fi rst league
title since ‘05
Seattle outfielder
testifies Tuesday in
Cuban smuggling trial
By ERIC SINGER
East Oregonian
Tuesday’s
Pendle-
ton-Hermiston girls basket-
ball team had more hype
surrounding it than usual.
Not only was it the
rubber match between the
two schools, but it was also
the de facto Columbia River
Conference championship
game, with the Buckaroos
playing for a chance at its
fi rst league
CRC
title since
2005.
“I told
the
girls
Hermiston
before the
game that
they had 32
minutes,
and those
32 minutes
Pendleton
could erase
11 years,”
Pendleton
coach Kevin
Porter said.
And after all 1,920
seconds ticked off the score-
board, the Buckaroos did just
that.
After holding a four point
halftime lead, Pendleton
outscored Hermiston 44-26
in the second half to run away
with a 59-37 victory to clinch
the CRC championship.
When the buzzer sounded,
Pendleton students rushed
the court and celebrated with
the team, with each girl and
coach wearing a smile that
was 11 years in the making.
“Oh my goodness!”
Haley Greb exclaimed
after the game. “This has
been our goal for this entire
season and I knew this team
could do it. I’m so proud of
my teammates ... it’s just so
crazy.”
“It’s so overwhelming but
See PENDLETON/2B
Mariners’
Martin tells
tale to jury
By CURT ANDERSON
Associated Press
37
59
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Pendleton’s Maureen Davies shoots the ball over Hermiston’s Jazlyn Romero in the Bucks’ 59-
37 win against the Bulldogs on Tuesday in Pendleton.
Pendleton’s
Wyatt Mor-
ris blocks
a shot
by Herm-
iston’s
Xavier
Rambo in
the Bucks’
62-42 win
against the
Bulldogs’
on Tuesday
in Pendle-
ton.
Staff photo by
E.J. Harris
Bucks celebrate in style
Pendleton beats
Hermiston, then
commemorates
league title
By MATT ENTRUP
East Oregonian
For a game featuring
several irregularities during
its build-up, Tuesday night’s
match-up with Hermiston sure
played out in familiar fashion
for the Pendleton boys basket-
ball team.
It took the Buckaroos
about nine minutes to get into
the swing of things, but after
senior Johnny Stuvland gave
them their fi rst lead of the
game with a low post-up early
in the second quarter, they
never gave it back and took
turns coming up with big plays
MIAMI — Seattle Mariners outfi elder
Leonys Martin told a Miami jury Tuesday
he crossed the U.S.-Mexico border without
any valid papers because he feared being
kidnapped or worse after he was smuggled
from Cuba by a group linked to a sports agent
and a baseball trainer.
Martin’s testimony came in the federal
trial of Bartolo Hernandez and Julio Estrada,
who are charged with conspiracy and alien
smuggling. Martin told jurors he crossed at
Laredo, Texas, in April 2011 after agreeing
to a fi ve-year, $15.5 million contract with the
Texas Rangers.
“My life was in
“ We were danger in Mexico,”
Martin testifi ed. “My
afraid that safety was at risk.”
Like other Cuban
I would be players
who have
testifi
ed
in
the case,
kidnapped Martin said
he
and that’s was whisked away
Cuba in 2010
why we from
by speedboat to
Mexico.
decided to Cancun,
Cuban players must
cross the establish residency
in a third country in
border.” order to sign lucrative
free agent contracts
— Leonys Mar- with Major League
tin, Baseball in the U.S.
Seattle Mariners
While in Cancun,
outfi elder Martin said “eight
or nine” men who
said they were armed
broke into his apartment with a crowbar and
pressured him to leave with them. Martin
refused and the men eventually left, but he
said the alleged smuggling ring decided
after that to relocate a group of players to
Monterrey, Mexico.
“The people were looking for us so we had
to put some distance between them and us,”
Martin testifi ed. “It was a diffi cult moment.
We knew what bad things could happen.”
While in Monterrey, a kidnapping attempt
was made against one of the smugglers but he
managed to escape out the back of his house,
See MARTIN/3B
CRC
Hermiston
Pendleton
42
62
for a 62-42 win at Warberg
Court.
An all-senior starting
lineup on Senior Night, some
new “3-peat” warm-up shirts
and a preplanned net-cutting
ceremony that would follow
the game to commemorate the
team’s third-straight Columbia
River Conference title all
added to Pendleton’s desire
to put a strong foot forward
against the cross-county rivals
they never need any extra
motivation to beat.
But, like they had before
in the season series Pendleton
swept, it was the Bulldogs
coming out strong and getting
See BOYS BASKETBALL/2B
AP Photo/Alan Diaz
Seattle Mariners outfi elder Leonys Mar-
tin walks out of the federal courthouse
with his attorney Paul Minoff, left, Tues-
day, Feb. 21, 2017, in Miami. Martin told
a Miami jury Tuesday he crossed the
U.S.-Mexico border without any valid
papers because he feared being kid-
napped or worse after he was smuggled
from Cuba by a group linked to a sports
agent and a baseball trainer.
Sports shorts
Lakers hire Magic Johnson in
major front offi ce shakeup
LOS ANGELES (AP) The Los Angeles
Lakers have fi red general manager Mitch
Kupchak and put Magic Johnson in charge of
basketball operations in a major shake-up of the
struggling franchise’s front offi ce.
Lakers owner Jeanie Buss also
removed her brother, Jim, from his
job as the Lakers’ executive vice
president of basketball operations
Tuesday.
Jeanie Buss then promoted
Johnson, the Hall of Fame point
Johnson
guard who returned to the fran-
chise earlier this year in an executive role.
Mitch Kupchak has been the 16-time NBA
champion franchise’s GM since 2000, when
Jerry West left the club.
The Lakers are mired in the worst four-year
stretch in franchise history. They are 19-39 this
season.
“I’m trying to get my
life back in order. I’m
trying to manage my
daughters and, most
of the time, they are
managing me.“
— Alex Rodriguez
Retired MLB player who is serv-
ing as a special advisor for the
New York Yankees this season.
A-Rod, 41, said he was unin-
terested in returning to play this
season, and turned down offers
after his playing days were over
with the Yankees in 2016.
Cline’s three-pointers lift
No. 14 Purdue to overtime win
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. (AP) — Ryan Cline
scored six of his 11 points in overtime to lift
No. 14 Purdue to a 74-70 victory over Penn
State on Tuesday night.
Cline hit consecutive
3-pointers to secure his team’s
sixth straight win in a game the
Boilermakers led for just 9:16.
Vincent Edwards added 14
points, Isaac Haas chipped in 13 and Dakota
Mathias scored 12 for the Boilermakers (23-5,
12-3 Big Ten).
Tony Carr scored 21 points, Lamar Stevens
added 18 and Mike Watkins fi nished with 11
for Penn State (14-14, 6-9).
Penn State led for all but 7:35 of regulation
and by as many as 10 points midway through
the fi rst half. But they surrendered the lead on a
dunk by Haas with 10:13 left. The Nittany Lions
used a 10-2 run to send the game into overtime.
THIS DATE IN SPORTS
1980 — The U.S. Olympic
hockey team stuns the Soviet
Union with a 4-3 victory
in the medal round of the
Winter Olympics in Lake
Placid, N.Y. Captain Mike
Eruzione scores the winning
goal midway through the fi nal
period.
2010 — Caltech ends its
310-game conference losing
streak in men’s basketball
beating Occidental College
46-45 in its season fi nale.
The Division III school
had lost every Southern
California Intercollegiate
Athletic Conference game
they had played since Jan.
23, 1985.
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