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About Cottage Grove sentinel. (Cottage Grove, Or.) 1909-current | View Entire Issue (March 30, 2016)
B S PORTS Wednesday, March 30, 2016 Section B South Lane County Sports and Recreation Contact Sports, 942-3325 or e-mail sports@cgsentinel.com Baseball fi nishes with one win at Volcano tournament Although the Lions went 1-3 over the past week, Cottage Grove at times showed it can keep up with 5A and 6A schools around the state BY SAM WRIGHT The Cottage Grove Sentinel From Wednesday up until Saturday, the Cottage Grove baseball team made its way to Salem each day to compete in the Volcanoes Spring Tourna- ment that featured mostly 5A and 6A schools from around the state. With Cottage Grove High School being a 4A school, the Lions were the underdogs in ev- ery matchup in the tournament. Their fi rst opponent was Roosevelt, a 6A school. Cottage Grove surprised the Roughrid- ers by taking an early 2-0 lead in the fi rst inning. However, by the top of the third, Roosevelt had put up three runs in the second and third innings together, and the Lions wouldn’t take the lead for the rest of the day. Though Cottage Grove gave a valiant batting effort, the Li- ons were only able to score two more runs (one in the fourth and fi fth innings each), while giving up two runs each in the fi fth and sixth innings, falling short in a 7-4 loss. Roosevelt presented a tough defensive front, allowing only four hits on the day by seniors Lucas Ward, Ryan East, Hunter Harris and Payton Presley. On the other side, the Lions struggled at times defensively with a total of six errors. While Photo by Sam Wright Waltzing home: Wyatt Sayles reaches home plate as TJ Bellamy waits to greet him before hitting another base hit and RBI. two errors were committed by freshmen, the other four were committed by upperclassmen, something that won’t happen very often to the Lions. “We’ll keep getting sharper as we progress,” head coach Dan Geiszler said of his team in the early season. Of course, mistakes will tend to whither as a team progresses through its season. Junior Brett Ollivant pitched throughout the entire game, totaling 77 pitches with an ERA of 2.33. A three-run loss to a 6A school is not all bad. In fact, the Lions proved that they can still compete with some 5A and 6A schools, and Thursday’s match up proved that they could even beat some. On Thursday, March 24, Cot- tage Grove came out of the dug- out ready to be taken as a serious competitor. In the top of the fi rst, the Lions came out with a four- run rally, stunning Springfi eld’s defense. However, the Millers attempted to answer back with two runs against pitcher Jaydin Osban. After two runs, Geiszler and Osban seemed to agree that it wasn’t Osban’s time and put TJ Bellamy on the mound in- stead. Bellamy began to heat up, closing the fi rst inning and al- lowing no scores until the bot- tom of the fourth, where Spring- fi eld tied the game at fi ve. However, key hits by TJ Bel- lamy, Hunter Harris and sopho- more Madison Cox kept the bat- ting momentum up. This brought in freshman Wyatt Sayles and a few others in the fi fth and sixth innings. The RBIs gave a 9-6 lead to Cottage Grove, and Har- ris then closed the game with a few fi erce pitches in the sixth inning. The rest of the tournament was a struggle as the Lions barely slipped against South- ridge (a 6A school), losing 6-5. The team’s batting average was .280, and then came an unfortu- nate 10-0 loss against Summit (a team that reached the fi nals in last year's 5A class). But Geiszler sees improvements as games go on. "We're swinging the bat well and pitching very well," he said. As for some errors throughout the tournament, the head coach knows the team will be able to clean up its game. "We're play- ing really good baseball, we just need to fi x a few things on the fi eld." Slabtown spring practice competition shows great display in strength and power The friendly competition gives good insight to where local athletes stand in their olympic weightlifting BY KACE ALLEN For the Sentinel Olympic Weightlifters gath- ered at the Armory building in downtown Cottage Grove for the fi rst ever “Slabtown” Spring Practice Competition. The Olympic lifts comprise of the “snatch” and the “clean and jerk”. Both lifts require strength, coordination and fl exibility. Top athletes spend a lifetime per- fecting their technique. This competition brought out 15 women and seven men weightlifters. Athletes got three attempts at each lift. The lift- ing started with snatches of 45 and 55 pounds by Alicia Bent- ley and Maryanne Miller. After a few lifts, a battle broke out among the women, with eight of them successfully snatching 65 pounds, then seven of them at 75 pounds and three athletes lifting 80 pounds. When the dust from that skirmish settled, that left Chelsea Williams and Dom Guzman both successful at 90 pounds, Mandie Fleming standing at 95 pounds and Chel- sea Miller at 105 pounds. Then heavy lifters Jamie De- Hart and Robin Brougher be- gan. DeHart looked solid in her opening attempt at 125 pounds, but she brought the barbell down early, resulting in a “no- lift”. Even so, she opted to in- crease her weight to 130 pounds for her second attempt, and she completed that snatch success- fully. Brougher opened with a successful lift of 136 pounds, taking the overall lead for the women. For her third and fi nal attempt, DeHart selected 140 pounds for the lead but could not get under the bar. Brougher went on to successful snatches of 146 pounds and 155 pounds for the overall lead among the women heading into the “clean and jerk” session. While the women were slug- ging it out, the men also began lifting. Dereck Bentley and Nate Fleming opened with snatches of 95 pounds. They both worked their way up in weight, and Ray Yager joined them once the bar- bell reached 135 pounds. Mike Hoagland opened at 145 pounds, and Brian Huynh joined them at 160 pounds, which took two of his three attempts to succeed. Yager took the lead momentari- ly with a snatch of 170 pounds, which Huynh tried and failed to match. That was when heavy hitters Brandon Glissmeyer and Keifer McInvale got started. Gliss- meyer opened with a success- ful snatch of 195 pounds, and McInvale followed him with a snatch of 202 pounds. Gliss- meyer selected 210 pounds for his second attempt but missed. Not to be denied, he used his third attempt to successfully snatch 210 pounds for the over- all lead. McInvale would have none of that, and for his sec- ond attempt he snatched 220 pounds. For his fi nal attempt, he lifted 235 pounds, taking the lead as the competition took a 10-minute break before starting the clean-and-jerk. When competition resumed with the clean-and-jerk, Miller and Alicia Bentley got things started with 75 pounds each. As they reached 85 pounds, they were joined by Carol Bridgens and Courtney Massa. Bridgens topped out at 100 pounds, and Massa completed her third lift at 106 pounds. Tarissa Richardson, Chelsea Williams and Saman- tha Wagner each successfully lifted 115, then Mandie Flem- ing and Lindsey Evans fi nished their day with successful lifts of 116 pounds. Kat Alvarez joined the fray and lifted 120 pounds. Chancey Davis and Chelsea Miller then momentarily shared the lead at 125 pounds, and Miller still had one lift to go. Dom Guzman was successful at 130 pounds, Miller success- fully lifted 135 pounds on her fi nal attempt, and Wagner then attempted 136 pounds, but she couldn’t fi nish. Guzman at- tempted but couldn’t lift 142 pounds. DeHart opened her clean and jerk at 160 pounds, but her fi rst attempt failed. She lifted that weight successfully on her sec- ond attempt and went for 170 pounds on her fi nal attempt. She didn’t succeed at 170 pounds, and that left Brougher with her fi rst attempt at 190 pounds. Af- ter lifting 190 pounds, Brougher was successful at 200 pounds and then at 205 pounds. Meanwhile, the men joined in with Dereck Bentley’s fi rst clean-and-jerk at 95 pounds. Nate Fleming started when the barbell reached 135 pounds, and Mike Hoagland joined at 145 pounds. The three of them battled it out until Hoagland was the last one standing with a successful lift at 195 pounds. Brian Huynh was the fi rst of the men to clean-and-jerk over 200 with an opener of 205 pounds, then successfully lifted 210 pounds on his second at- tempt and was unable to lift 215 pounds for his third and fi nal attempt. Ray Yager opened his clean-and-jump at 225 pounds successfully, and Brandon Gliss- meyer started with 245 pounds. Yager missed an attempt at 250 pounds, but he was successful with that weight on his third and fi nal attempt. Keifer McInvale started with a good clean-and-jerk of 253 pounds. For his second lift, Glissmeyer successfully com- pleted 255 pounds, which Mc- Invale answered with a good lift at 265 pounds. Glissmeyer then beat that lift by one pound, succeeding with 266 pounds for his third and fi nal lift. With ev- eryone else having used all their lifts, McInvale opted to make his fi nal clean and jerk attempt at 275 pounds and missed. Photo by Sam Wright Robin Brougher takes the lead with her 136-pound snatch lift. She lifted 155 pounds for the lead in the event. Athletes of the Week Bowling team earns accolades Left to Right: Coach Ernie Owen, Chance Arnold (Most Improved Bowler), Josh Al- len, Nikki Allen, Jessy Thomason, Olivia Perkins (Most Inspirational Bowler), Jaydyn Arnold, Skyler Arnold (Most Valuable Bowler) Melissa Miller (Third Place All Star Bowler), Jared Simmons, Josh Stewart, Coach Kevin Carver, Coach Zach Thomason and Coach Vince Fiattarone