A10
SPORTS
Wallowa County Chieftain
Wednesday, April 13, 2022
Crawford:
Continued from Page A9
Outlaws’ hard-fought 65-58
loss to Gervais a day earlier
in the fi rst round of the 2A
state playoff s — the loss that
ended his career at 520-275
— he was formulating line-
ups in his mind.
“I’m always thinking
about lineups and the team. I
had completely put together
next year’s team in my
mind,” he said.
‘This is the time’
Davis Carbaugh/The Observer
Enterprise’s Zac Knapp, front, runs during the La Grande
Invitational track meet at La Grande High School on
Friday, April 8, 2022.
Track:
Continued from Page A9
The Joseph boys, who
took 11th with 19.75
points, got a fi rst-place fi n-
ish from Kale Ferguson in
the discus with a mark of
143-feet-2½, and a sec-
ond-place fi nish from Fer-
guson in the javelin at 137-
feet-11½. The Eagles also
got a tie for seventh in the
high jump from James
Burney (5-feet-2), and an
Outlaws:
Continued from Page A9
hits. Sophie Moeller went
4-for-4, doubled twice and
scored three times, and
Alex Rowley added three
hits. Moeller, Kirkland and
Liz Rowley also had two
stolen bases apiece.
Meanwhile, Liz Row-
ley was close to perfection.
In the fi ve-inning win, she
allowed just one hit, hit a
batter and struck out 12,
throwing fi rst-pitch strikes
to 14 of the 17 batters she
faced.
In the second game,
Rowley moved her con-
tribution from the circle
Golf:
Continued from Page A9
and Ashlynn Greer fi n-
ished with a score of 140.
On Friday, April 8, at
Birch Creek in Pendleton,
Jennings led the Outlaws
again with a score of 98
as the team fi nished with a
tally of 484 to place 10th.
McDowell fi nished with a
score of 117, Siebe shot a
126 and Young had a score
eighth-place fi nish from
the 4x100 relay team of
Gavin Russell, Dylan Rog-
ers, Jayden McNall and
Burney in 50.50.
For the Eagle girls, Iona
McDonald placed sixth in
the 300 hurdles in 58.23,
and Basey Dawson was
sixth in the javelin with a
throw of 91-feet-8.
Enterprise continues on
the track April at the Buck
Track Classic in Pend-
leton, while Joseph is at
the Sherman Invitational
April 16 at Moro.
to the plate, going 3-for-3
with a double, a triple, fi ve
RBIs and four runs scored.
Kirkland added another
3-for-3 eff ort with three
doubles, three RBIs and
three runs scored to fi n-
ish the day 7-for-7 with
eight RBIs, fi ve extra-base
hits and six runs scored.
She reached base all eight
times she stepped up. Abby
Straight added three hits,
and Moeller scored four
times.
As a team, the Outlaws
had 16 hits, worked 11
walks and didn’t strike out.
Meyers pitched all four
innings, surrendering two
runs on three hits, walking
a batter and striking out
eight.
of 143.
For Wallowa/Joseph,
which took seventh at 447,
Homan fi nished with a
score of 91. Gorham fol-
lowed with a 96, Gibbs
shot a 125 and McKee had
a 135.
For the Enterprise girls,
Stonebrink turned in a
score of 122 and Cunning-
ham had a score of 139.
Both teams next com-
pete at the Grant Union
Invitational April 15 in
John Day.
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The fi nal year
His fi nal team, which
went 15-11 and was one win
away from the state tourna-
ment, took some lumps early,
but came together to take
third in the Blue Mountain
Conference, reach the tour-
nament title game, and over
the course of the season earn
wins over both Union, the
eventual state champion, and
Stanfi eld, which took sixth.
“… Going into this year,
now I’ve got my whole team
intact for this year, of which
there were two senior start-
ers, Rilyn (Kirkland) and
Jada (Gray), and then the rest
I had to put together,” he said,
noting the 2020-21 season
being so severely impacted
by COVID and eventually
moved to May and June
hampered many of his play-
ers. “The rest of those girls,
as of a year ago, they got to
play a couple of games there,
but not really. Not much. It
wasn’t like it was anything
that was going to prepare
them for what we were going
to do this year. … So presea-
son was all about prepping us
and seeing what we got and
where our strengths were and
so on.”
The team’s pinnacle was
on Jan. 15 when it earned a
47-39 home win over the
Bobcats.
“We played Union tough.
And actually in the Union
Tournament, when we played
them the fi nal day we played
— I hadn’t seen us come out
on day two, in this case day
three, and play with some
Kathy Aney/East Oregonian, File
Enterprise coach Mike Crawford and his players react with emotion after a Blue Mountain District
tournament game against Heppner Saturday, Feb. 22, 2020, at the Pendleton Convention
Center. Enterprise beat the Mustangs 40-38, notching third place and Crawford’s 500th win.
conviction like we’re ready
to attack. … That was day
three, and we played to the
end,” he added of a Decem-
ber matchup, a 45-36 loss
in Union. “It was a really
good game, and then going
into the (league) season, the
fi rst time when we played
Union at home was the day
we beat them. … I knew we
were good, I knew we were
good enough. We were good
enough to play with the teams
in the fi nal eight.
Outside looking in
Seeing teams Enterprise
had beaten make the state
tournament, while the Out-
laws were stuck at home,
is something Crawford has
witnessed before, with one
example that immediately
jumped out being 2017.
“I’m sitting there in the
fi rst round, watching the
fi rst game, it was Imbler vs.
Weston-McEwen. We played
Weston-McEwen twice that
year — we were not in the
same league — we had beaten
them at home by 20 and beat
them there by 10,” he said.
“We had beaten Imbler — we
split with Imbler. Here they
are in the fi nal eight playing
in the fi rst round and we’re
not there.”
Crawford said there are
plenty of “what ifs” over the
course of 33 years, recalling a
blown 12-point fourth-quar-
ter lead in the 1997 state
semifi nals against Santiam
Christian when a timeout
could have stalled an SC rally
— but Enterprise didn’t have
one. SC went on to roll in the
state championship game,
while Enterprise — unde-
feated before that night —
settled for third.
Another was a back-and-
forth battle in the 2001 state
title game against Sherman
which was a battle in the
post he knew would be deter-
mined by which team lost its
post player to fouls. Enter-
prise did, and lost the fi nal,
45-37.
“There’s so many situa-
tions over the course of his-
tory. I had a lot of good
teams, I had a lot of good
opportunities and moments.
I don’t really regret anything
there. You can only control
what you can. You put them
on the fl oor and they gotta
play,” he said.
The highlight of his 33
years, obviously, was the
1996 state championship, but
Crawford also took a ton of
pride in Enterprise’s consis-
tency over the years.
“There was a lot of good
moments that stand out with
individual accomplishments
by kids, team accomplish-
ments that were better than
maybe we should have been,”
he said. “They’re all pretty
special. I think that for me,
the thing that I’m proudest
of (is) there were only three
years that my teams did not
make the district tournament.
One was the very fi rst year I
coached. We only won four
games, only won one league
game that year. But after that,
we never fi nished worse than
fi fth. There were two years
that we fi nished fi fth that
we did not go because they
only took four teams. In all
the later years they took fi ve
teams. We weren’t very often
the fi fth-place team, either.
We were competitive every
year. Kids worked hard over
and over again.”
Getting a
program going
He said a conversation
he has had several times
throughout the years is about
how to build a program and
how long it takes. For Craw-
ford, he said it was about fi ve
years to get EHS where he
wanted it to be.
But once it’s in place, it’s
hard to slow down. And he
believes his eventual prede-
cessor should be able to keep
rolling.
“I had a conversation
with Jordan (Klebaum-John-
ston), the coach at Union,
about how you go for 33
years doing the same stuff ,”
he said. “You can say all
you want about ‘They know
what we do,’ but it’s obvi-
ous to me that they may
know what we do, but that
doesn’t mean they can stop
it. We’ve always been one of
the higher scoring teams, one
of the more diffi cult to play
— maybe there’s something
to it. Old school’s not neces-
sarily the wrong school.”
When asked how he
wanted his teams to be
defi ned, he said that was
actually a question he asked
his players.
“I (would) give them a
paper that I want them to fi ll
out. And the last thing that I
put on there was if you were
somebody not on this team
watching this team, what
would you want them to think
of you? What would you
want them to say about you?”
he said. “I wanted them to
hustle, I wanted them to play
tough defense, I wanted them
to run off ensively. Our off en-
sive game started predomi-
nantly off defense, and I think
we pretty much did that.”
For the coach, though, it
went beyond the basketball
court. Crawford wanted to be
available in case any of his
players ever needed him.
“When you’re involved
in the school and you’re
attached to the school, you
want them to be successful,
you want them to graduate,
and you want them to have
a plan for their life,” he said.
“I’d be involved in all of their
lives in that regard as much
as I could or as they needed
me to be or that they wanted
me to be.”
Family played a big role
throughout his career, and he
said the support of Tammy
was instrumental over the
years.
“She’s been very support-
ive. It wouldn’t have func-
tioned, it wouldn’t have
worked whatsoever, if it
would not have been some-
thing that she was good with
during that time,” he said of
his wife, who he noted was
also an Enterprise teacher
and coach for several years.
“My coaching, and hav-
ing my boys play, and being
involved with the football
program when they were in
school, being involved with
the basketball program —
because I’m coaching girls
(and) they’re in the boys pro-
gram — Tammy’s always
been right behind me. If
(she) wouldn’t have been,
it wouldn’t have worked,
period.”
The support of the Enter-
prise community was key,
too.
“I feel like Enterprise has
been an extraordinary place
for a lot of people who teach
in this district,” he said. “The
history has been once you got
here you taught your whole
career here. And I think that’s
another refl ection on how
cool this community and
how supportive this commu-
nity has been to the school.
And then in the programs, we
played in front of people who
wanted to watch us play.”
As for if he’ll ever pull a
move like Tampa Bay quar-
terback Tom Brady and
return, he said it’s unlikely,
but won’t say never.
“We’ll see. I’m not going
to say no, because as soon
as I say no, there’s some-
thing that would happen that
would be a perfect creation, I
guess of why it could happen
again.”
He leaves the court with
520 wins in 795 games, one
state title, hundreds of play-
ers he worked with, and
contentment.
“No doubt about it,” he
said when asked if he was
content with his career.
“I’m ready for the next
challenges.”
ND
RILYN KIRKLA
Wallowa
r the
day to remember fo
Rilyn Kirkland had a last week against Heppner/Ione. In
Valley softball team s, the senior went a combined 7-for-
two blowout victorie t two home runs, drove in eight runs,
7 at the plate, hi d three doubles. The day included
ha
scored six times and e opener, a 14-0 win, where she had
th
in
t
or
eff
an RBI double
a 4-for-4
five RBIs. She added
two home runs and e week against Burns to finish the
later in th
nine RBIs.
week 8-for-12 with lissa Kirkland)
udly
Pro nsore d b y
o
Sp
(Photo courtesy of Me
OF
THE
The 2022
Kitten Season
is in full
“purr”
As to the question of why
retire now, he said the time is
right because he and his wife,
Tammy, are ready for some
time away.
“Tammy and I have talked
for a long time about going
south, spending some time
in the warmer weather, the
advantages of that, (and) I like
to golf, too,” he said. “I like
to fi sh. We just decided this
is the time. I think I told you,
but I sat down and made res-
ervations for Kauai next year
at the end of January/Febru-
ary right there, a little 10-day
stretch, and when I made the
reservations, I decided I was
going to be done.”
Interestingly, his career
may have actually been
extended by the COVID-19
pandemic, an event that shut
down so much over the past
two years. Crawford noted
that he likely would have
wrapped his career in 2021
had it not been so marred by
the coronavirus.
“I wanted it to be as nor-
mal as possible, and I thought
this was a perfect year to go
out. I had a quality group of
kids,” he said. “The unfor-
tunate part is that no matter
what, when you walk away,
you walk away from kids
that are still in the program. I
have regret there, but I would
have regret no matter when
that happens. And I hope they
understand.”