A10
Wallowa County Chieftain
SPORTS/REGIONAL
State:
Continued from Page A9
younger girls stepped up. They
just knew that they had to do
their job, and they did.”
In the Eastern Oregon XC
Championships on Oct. 22 in
Pendleton, the Outlaws again
took the top spot, this time win-
ning the Super Champs fast heat
over La Grande and Heppner.
In the Champs race, La Grande
edged Wallowa Valley by a sin-
gle point despite Camdyn Weer
taking the top spot.
Hurley was a constant atop
the leaderboard for the Outlaws,
as she took top honors on the
team in all seven races this fall.
However, the Outlaws had mul-
tiple runners in the mix during
various races, giving Moody a
good problem to have in years
to come — depth. Indeed, the
team had almost an entirely dif-
ferent top ﬁ ve from week to
week.
Hurley, Freyja Hostetter,
Annie Miller, Harguess and
Opal McDonald were the top
ﬁ ve in the opener at Catherine
Creek. A week later, Hurley,
Miller, Camdyn and Lilly Weer,
and Harvey were the headliners
for the Outlaws. At Stanﬁ eld, it
was Hurley, Miller, Hellinger,
McDonald and Chloe Hatch. In
both Baker and Heppner, Hur-
ley, Lilly Weer, Miller, Hell-
inger and Harguess paved the
Duncan:
Continued from Page A9
Enterprise, and was an anchor at
linebacker for Enterprise.
He was joined on the ﬁ rst-
team defense by defensive end
Cody Fent and interior lineman
John Howard.
“Our team was way better
than it has been in the past years
— it was mostly (because of)
our defense,” Duncan said. “...
We had a bunch more players
come out this year than normal.
That’s what helped us.”
Three additional players,
meanwhile, were part of the
ﬁ rst-team oﬀ ense, led by run-
ning back Gideon Gray. Caden
Fent was honored as a ﬁ rst-team
oﬀ ensive end, and Nevin Gold-
smith was a ﬁ rst-team oﬀ ensive
guard.
The ﬁ nal ﬁ rst-team honor
went to Tyler Knapp, who was
tapped as ﬁ rst-team kicker.
Enterprise loaded up on sec-
Knapp:
Continued from Page A9
year on,” Knapp said. “I was
like, ‘Everything has to come
out today.’ All the work I put in
it comes down to today. … To
break the curse is a dream come
true.”
Only one other runner for
Enterprise has won state —
Krista Stangel won back-to-
back titles for the girls program
in 2004 and 2005.
Knapp’s margin of victory
in the championship race — he
ﬁ nished 36 seconds ahead of
runner-up Wyatt Montgomery
of La Pine — bests any margin
from a runner in the champion-
ship in program history. John-
son won his title in 1998 by
just two seconds. Ribich was
Maria Weer/Contributed Photo
Jonah Lyman took eighth place for the Wallowa Valley middle school
cross-country team, which took fourth place overall at the state meet
Sunday, Oct. 31, 2021, in Monmouth.
way, and at the Eastern Oregon
Championships, the team lead-
ers were Hurley, Lilly Weer,
Harvey, Miller and Harguess.
At one point in the season,
more than half the team’s run-
ners — 10 out of the 19 —
placed in the top ﬁ ve in the fast
heat.
Another major component
to the Outlaw success that also
shows their depth was pack run-
ning — how closely runners are
ﬁ nishing to each other. One way
to measure thison a result sheet
is in the time between Wal-
lowa Valley’s ﬁ rst and ﬁ fth run-
ners. Only once in seven races
was that gap more than a min-
ute. Twice it was less than 30
seconds, and twice more it was
under 50 seconds.
“It’s a heck of a bunch of
girls. I could probably divide
them (into two teams) and try to
get them as equal as I could and
they would beat each other ﬁ ve
times each in 10 races,” Moody
said.
The future is very bright for
this group of athletes at both the
middle school and high school
level. Close to half of the 19
runners will be moving up to the
high school level next fall, add-
ing depth to a team that gradu-
ates just one senior.
“We’re only losing one girl
in the high school, and it’ll deﬁ -
nitely make the other girls work
harder,” Moody said.
While he noted the jump
Wednesday, November 17, 2021
from the 1.8-mile middle school
race to the 3.1-mile high school
race can be a challenge for some
runners, he believes that, given
time to make the adjustment,
more trophies could be on the
horizon for this group.
“They’re capable of winning
a state championship or two,”
Moody said.
That is, he noted, if they
maintain cohesiveness over the
next few years.
“If you keep this group
together, there’s going to be
some doors opening for you
basically,” he said, “and you got
the nucleus of a great team, but
you have to stay together.”
Boys take fourth at state
The Wallowa Valley boys
took fourth at the state meet,
capping a season that saw them
win four out of seven meets and,
like the girls, has them in good
position for the future.
Jonah Lyman led the way all
season, and did so, too, at the
state meet. He won three races
overall, and at state placed sev-
enth with a time of 9:58.60. He
was the only runner in the top
50 for the Outlaws. Next up was
Kooper Grover, who came in
64th in 11:07.20. Colton Keﬀ er
was 72nd in 11:13.10. Emmett
Flynn was 94th in a time of
11:35.00, and George McDon-
ald was 105th in 11:43.90.
Wallowa Valley ﬁ nished with
127 points for the fourth-place
ﬁ nish.
ond-team awards, as well. Jack-
son Decker earned two sec-
ond-team nods, on oﬀ ense as
a quarterback, and on defense
as a defensive back. Goldsmith
was a second-team defensive
end, Knapp was a second-team
defensive back and Gray was a
second-team linebacker and sec-
ond-team punter.
Cody Fent was honorable
mention at center, and Caden
Fent was honorable mention at
linebacker.
Paul Stangel rounded out the
ﬁ nal Enterprise award as man-
ager of the year.
“I want to congratulate the
whole team. We did amazing
this year,” Duncan added.
For Wallowa, ﬁ ve athletes
earned SD2-East honors.
Ty Prince paved the way for
the Cougars on both oﬀ ense
and defense, and as a result
was named both a second-team
oﬀ ensive lineman and defensive
lineman. Jesse Duncan garnered
a spot on the second team as a
linebacker, and Lucas Hulse was
named to the second team as a
tight end.
Lute Ramsden was tapped as
honorable mention at quarter-
back despite missing the last half
of the season due to a leg injury,
and Jose Mendez was named
honorable mention at punter.
13 seconds ahead of the run-
ner-up in 2013. Coughlan won
his by just 3.5 seconds. Stangel
was the closest, winning by 23
seconds in 2004, but the repeat
eﬀ ort was closer, as she won the
2005 race by just six seconds.
Frontrunning became a
theme for Knapp, who not only
won all eight of his races — he
won them with ease. No racer all
season managed to stay within
20 seconds of him. His ﬁ rst race
of the year, in fact, was his clos-
est, when he won the Cather-
ine Creek Scamper in Union by
a mere 23.9 seconds. Six of his
races were won by more than 30
seconds. Three were by more
than a minute, with his widest
margin of victory a whopping
83.6 seconds at the Wallowa
County Invitational.
He said after the state race
his plan that day was the same
as every race — put it away
early.
My tactic, just like always,
you gotta kill (it) in the ﬁ rst
mile. Don’t even give it a
chance,” he said.
“I hit my ﬁ rst mile exactly
what I was hoping for for a (per-
sonal record).”
In ﬁ ve races, including his
last four, he broke the 16-min-
ute mark. And he broke Rib-
ich’s old program record not
just once, but twice. He ﬁ rst
broke the record with a time
of 15:24.9 in Stanﬁ eld, and at
the district meet in John Day in
October, shattered that with a
time of 15:14.7.
Ribich said he knew that
his school record was in trou-
ble when Knapp stopped split-
ting time between soccer and
cross-country, and focused
solely on running.
“Zac Knapp is an inspiration
to me, too,” said Ribich, who
was attending the state track
meet to watch his former team.
“I know the success he has in
anything he does. … He’s an
inspiration to me. Being able to
root for him is easy to do.”
Knapp said having Ribich
in the crowd, spurring him on,
provided a boost.
“It was pretty inspiring; I’m
not going to lie,” he said. “I
don’t hear a lot of people when
I’m running, but I heard David
clear as day.”
Ribich spoke highly of not
only the eﬀ ort put forward by
Knapp, but also by the team as
it won a second-straight OSAA
state title and third-straight
unoﬃ cially.
“To put it simply,” he said, “I
think this was the best year for
Enterprise cross-country ever.”
Ronald Bond/Wallowa County Chieftain
Enterprise’s Chase Duncan tries to track down a Crane player during
the season-opening game of the season. Duncan was named 1A
Special District 2-West defensive player of the year.
NEED HEALTH INSURANCE?
OPEN ENROLLMENT FOR 2022 PLANS
NOVEMBER 1, 2021 TO JANUARY 15, 2022
Frontier grocery
stores ready for
Thanksgiving
despite supply
chain woes
By ALEX WITTWER
EO Media Group
JOHN DAY — Supply chain issues
gripping the nation have led to shortages in
everything from semiconductors to paper
trays at school cafeterias, but Thanksgiving
looks to be running smoothly and on time,
according to grocery stores in rural Oregon
cities.
“Turkey’s on the table. We’ve got turkey
already in our freezer,” said Blaine Huﬀ -
man, owner of Huﬀ man’s Select Market in
Prairie City. “I’m sure there’s going to be
items we’re going to be short on, but on the
whole we’re ﬁ ne.”
Grocery stores have had to adapt to a
changing supply landscape that has seen
shortages crop up in unexpected places.
“We don’t know one load from the next
what we’re going to get — it changes every
time,” Huﬀ man said. “The food supply
chain is vulnerable, a lot of stuﬀ is still sit-
ting out in the ocean.”
Huﬀ man said he had some issues order-
ing premade pies for Thanksgiving, and the
store was out of stock of those items. Sup-
plies for homemade pies, however, were
available.
Considering that smaller markets lack
the same buying power as larger chains
such as Safeway or Walmart, there was a
cause for concern that residents in frontier
towns, including John Day or Prairie City,
might have to travel further to ﬁ ll their shop-
ping cart for the upcoming holiday. Grocery
stores report that while ordering has been
a challenge, the staples for a Thanksgiving
feast have yet to cause any concerns.
“Before, I was able to buy pallets of cer-
tain things like condensed milk — when it
comes to those really big staples, a lot of it
is on an allocation that you can’t buy big
amounts like that because they wouldn’t be
able to service everybody,” said Mike Shaf-
fer, operations manager for Chester’s Mar-
ket in John Day. “As far as staples go, we’re
sitting pretty good.”
Shaﬀ er said he has had to order months
in advance for key items, especially during
Thanksgiving and similar holidays where
supplies go fast as the holiday approaches
and the deadline for putting the turkey in the
oven looms.
For now, the store is well stocked for the
upcoming feast, according to Shaﬀ er.
“It was really easy to get what you
needed before all this stuﬀ happened and
before — I call it a logistical nightmare, but
you know all the logistic issues that every-
one is experiencing — before that we’d
have pretty big item counts, big ads so peo-
ple could come in and get a good deal on
whatever they need for dinner and stuﬀ
like that, so it has changed,” Shaﬀ er said.
“If you commit to something like we did
this year — if you have to reorder it, that’s
where you may run into an issue because
everybody else is reordering, especially for
the season.”
Supply chain issues have cropped up
from a myriad of pandemic-related minu-
tiae, such as labor and raw material short-
ages — including dock workers and truck
drivers — to low production yields and
increased costs of goods as shipping costs
skyrocket due to increases in fuel and con-
tainer prices.
That means when orders ﬁ nally arrive at
grocery stores, the contents might be less
than what was ordered, or the order itself
would be delayed.
“It’s hard to plan around, I’ll put it to you
that way,” Shaﬀ er said.
Those issues exacerbated an already
vulnerable system. Still, the grocery stores
remain optimistic about the upcoming
holiday.
“It’s not like it was last year,” Huﬀ man
said. “I think it will be good. I think every-
thing will be good.”
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