SPORTS
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 28, 2017
PENDLETON
Prep Basketball
Dawgs
continue
skid
1B
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Former Bucks give back
Hermiston gives
up fi rst half
lead, moves to
consolation bracket
East Oregonian
LAKE OSWEGO — The
Hermiston Bulldogs returned
to the court after four days
off, and looked as if they were
on their way to their second
victory
GIRLS
of
the
BASKETBALL season.
B u t
l i k e
similar
outings,
Hermiston
t h e y
weren’t
able to last
the full 32
minutes
fell
Oregon City and
to Oregon
C i t y ,
42-39,
on Day
1 of the Lake Oswego Nike
Interstate Shootout.
The game marked the
fi rst of many in the four-day
tournament that is comprised
of 24 teams, including Herm-
iston. Among the mix are the
top schools from OSAA’s
Class 6A, Southridge and
McNary, and from Class 5A,
Marist Catholic and La Salle
Prep.
Hermiston went toe-to-toe
with No. 2 seeded Oregon
City and entered the break
with a narrow 25-22 lead.
But a sluggish third quarter
for the Bulldogs (1-8) and a
breakout third for the Lakers
(2-5) gave Oregon City a late
lead that it would hold until
the fi nal buzzer.
Leading its efforts was
senior Kylie Guelsdorf, who
scored 14 points.
For Hermiston, junior
Jordan Thomas fi nished with
a team-high 12 points.
With the loss, the Bulldogs
move into the consolation
bracket and face host school,
Lake Oswego, on Friday.
———
39
42
HHS
14 11
4 10 — 39
OCHS
11 11 12
8 — 42
HERMISTON — J. Thomas 12, H. Thomp-
son 10, J. Romero 8, A. Green 3, S. Stefani
2, Regan Meyers 2, M. Wilson 1, J. Ray 1.
OREGON CITY — K. Guelsdorf 14, T.
Bradford 9, K. Kathan 7, A. Edwards 6, E.
Welch 4, M. Hood 2.
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Pendleton High graduate Alex O’Rourke, second from right, plays a dexterity games with attendees during a winter baseball workshop
Wednesday in Pendleton.
Ex-PHS baseball stars teach next wave of Buckaroos
By ERIC SINGER
East Oregonian
PENDLETON — The booming
sounds of baseball gloves popping
and bats cracking echoed throughout
the Pendleton baseball indoor
facility Wednesday afternoon, as a
select group of Buckaroo youth had
the chance to learn fundamentals
of the game from some of the best
players the school has produced in
the past decade.
All week, kids have been
swarming to the facility for skills
camps with former Pendleton stars
Alex O’Rourke (catching), Tommy
Lane (hitting) and Lane Richards
(fi elding) with the spots for the
camps purchased at the Buckaroo
Booster auction. All three athletes
have volunteered for the camps
since they graduated from Pend-
leton and have enjoyed it every
single time.
“For me, it’s pure fun,” said
Lane, a 2013 graduate of Pendleton
High. “It’s a fun time and it’s not a
burden on me by any means.”
Lane, who stands with a sturdy
6-foot-7, certainly has enough expe-
rience and enough success to make
the campers want to soak in every
piece of information that’s shared
in the four, one-hour sessions. A
stellar career at Pendleton earned
him a chance to play at Mt. Hood
Community College, where he hit
over .300 in both seasons and then
earned a scholarship to play Divi-
sion-I baseball at Marshall Univer-
sity in Huntington, West Virginia.
While at Marshall, Lane played
in 108 total games over two seasons
and hit 15 career home runs with 74
RBI. He earned Conference USA
Newcomer of the Year as a junior
when he hit for a .296 average with
13 home runs.
“I just hope to give a different
point of view on baseball,” Lane
said. “They could already be on the
track to being a good player, or they
could be struggling and something
I say may fl ip a switch and if that
happens for one kid out of 12 or 12
out of 12, that’s a big win for me.”
After graduating in the spring,
Lane moved back to Pendleton and
is currently trying to land an appren-
ticeship to become a journeyman
electrical lineman. While still in
Pendleton, Lane said he plans on
volunteering to coach within the
baseball program this spring.
For O’Rourke, who graduated
from PHS in 2015, he put in a good
amount of preparation on what he
wanted to teach because he knows
that opportunities to learn the nitty
gritty fundamentals of catching can
be scarce for youth baseball players.
“A lot of these kids haven’t had
a lot of fundamentals taught to them
yet,” he said. “So it feels good that
I can come back and actually help
somebody learn something that
maybe I struggled with at that age
or that I wish I had known. It’s a
good feeling to actually impact the
baseball program even though I’m
not still a part of it.”
O’Rourke is one of the best
catchers to come out of Pendleton’s
program, becoming just the third
player ever to earn four varsity
letters in baseball. He then earned
a scholarship to Division-I power-
house Oregon State, where he
transferred after just one season for
a stopover at Linn-Benton Commu-
nity College after he realized it just
wasn’t the right fi t in Corvallis.
“I was kind of focused more on
See CAMP/3B
Altuve named AP Male Athlete of the Year
By KRISTIE RIEKEN
Associated Press
HOUSTON — Jose Altuve led the
Houston Astros to their fi rst World
Series title with a win over the Los
Angeles Dodgers in November and
picked up the franchise’s fi rst MVP
trophy in more than two decades a
couple of weeks later.
And as his huge 2017 is coming to
a close, the diminutive second baseman
already is looking for more.
“Winning the World Series, winning
the MVP, you feel like you have every-
thing,” Altuve told The Associated
Press. “But my perspective is to try and
get better every year and if we win one
World Series, why not win another one?
Just keep playing for the team and keep
playing for my city.”
Altuve, who was one of only a
handful of players who endured the
Astros’ painful rebuilding process en
route to this year’s championship,
which gave hope to a city ravaged by
Hurricane Harvey, was chosen as The
Associated Press Male Athlete of the
Year.
Results of voting by U.S. editors
and news directors was announced
Wednesday. The 5-foot-6 dynamo got
715 points, beating out New England
quarterback Tom Brady, who had 646,
and third-place fi nisher Cleveland
Cavaliers star LeBron James, with 626.
On Tuesday, Katie Ledecky was
named AP Female Athlete of the Year.
Altuve is a fi ve-time All-Star who
led the majors with a career-high .346
batting average and his 204 hits topped
the American League. He is the fi rst
player in MLB history to lead his league
in hits in four straight seasons. He tied
a career-best with 24 homers and had
81 RBIs. He was second in the AL by
scoring 112 runs, his on-base percentage
of .410 ranked third, he was third with 32
steals and his .547 slugging percentage
ranked sixth.
His work made him the second Astro
to win an MVP award , joining Hall of
Famer Jeff Bagwell, who picked up the
National League’s honors in 1994.
Altuve carried his stellar regular
season into the postseason, where he
paced the Astros in their ALDS win
over the Boston Red Sox by hitting
.533 with an outrageous 1.133 slugging
percentage.
Altuve spent his early years with the
Astros toiling in relative obscurity as
Houston lost 100-plus games in each
AP Photo/David J. Phillip, File
In this Oct. 21, 2017, fi le photo, Houston Astros manag-
er A.J. Hinch and Jose Altuve hold the championship
trophy after Game 7 of baseball’s American League
Championship Series against the New York Yankees,
in Houston. Altuve was named The Associated Press
Male Athlete of the Year on Wednesday.
Sports shorts
Rafael Nadal withdraws from
Brisbane International
BRISBANE, Australia (AP) — Top-ranked
Rafael Nadal has withdrawn from the Brisbane
International due to his “late start of preparation”
for the new season.
Brisbane International tourna-
ment director Cameron Pearson
said Thursday that he had received
word of Nadal’s withdrawal earlier
in the day.
The joint ATP and WTA
tournament begins Sunday at Pat
Rafter Arena.
Nadal
Nadal, who pulled out of the
ATP Finals in London after a loss to David
Goffi n in mid-November due pain in his
right knee, had earlier tweeted: “I am sorry to
announce I won’t be coming to Brisbane this
year. My intention was to play but I am still not
ready after last year’s long season and the late
start of my preparation.”
“I’m real happy for the
guys with the way the
season’s gone. It’s been
a tough go. This group
has a ton of character
and a lot of fi ght. It’s
the fi rst time we’ve won
consecutive back-to-
back games, which is a
big deal.”
— Rick Carlisle
The Dallas Mavericks head coach
said after snapping an eight-
game road losing streak with a
98-94 victory over the Indiana
Pacers on Wednesday night.
Iowa rallies, beats Boston
College in Pinstripe Bowl
NEW YORK (AP) — Iowa beat Boston
College 27-20 in the frigid Pinstripe Bowl
on Wednesday night to snap a
fi ve-game bowl losing streak.
The Hawkeyes (8-5) had
been the only team in the nation
to lose a bowl game in each of
the last four seasons. Iowa had
last won a bowl game in 2010
and started the losing streak the next season.
It ended in New York.
The Hawkeyes had two clutch plays that
kept it close: Iowa safety Jake Gervase inter-
cepted a pass on the third play of the game
and returned it to the BC 6. The Hawkeyes
got a fi eld goal. And Akrum Wadley returned
a kickoff 72 yards that led to a touchdown on
Stanley’s 8-yard TD pass to Noah Fant. With a
short fi eld, Iowa was stout and kept it at 17-10
at halftime.
THIS DATE IN SPORTS
2003 — Jamal Lewis
becomes the fi fth player in
NFL history to run for 2,000
yards in a season. He gained
114 yards on 27 carries in
Baltimore’s 13-10 overtime
victory against Pittsburgh,
fi nishing the year with 2,066
yards — second-most in NFL
history.
2008 — The Cleveland
Browns lose to Pittsburgh
31-0, setting an NFL record
by failing to score a touch-
down for six straight games.
2016 — Dillon Brooks
hits a 3-pointer with 0.8
seconds left to give No. 21
Oregon an 89-87 victory over
No. 2 UCLA in the Pac-12
opener for both teams.
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