B
S PORTS
Wednesday, June 22, 2016
Section B
South Lane County Sports and Recreation
Contact Sports, 942-3325 or e-mail sports@cgsentinel.com
Three Lions compete
in All-Star series in
Roseburg
Athletes of the Week:
Harris, Ward, Presley
South goes 1-2 in a close series, but Presley
wins yet another accolade with the team's
MVP award
BY SAM WRIGHT
The Cottage Grove Sentinel
Over the weekend, three re-
cent graduates of Cottage Grove
high school and star baseball
players made the journey to
Roseburg to play in the 4A All-
Star series. Hunter Harris, Lucas
Ward and Payton Presley all had
one last chance to represent Cot-
tage Grove on a baseball fi eld
in a series of three games over
the course of two days. Harris,
Ward and Presley were part of
an 18-man roster that featured
two coaches.
The three players were on the
South team’s roster that includ-
ed their very own coach, Dan
Geiszler, alongside state-cham-
pion head coach Tim Cleland of
Henley.
Of the three games, the South
only managed to come out victo-
rious in one of the three games,
but each game was close and
neither team was convincingly
better than the other.
The South’s two losses came
in a 5-4 and 6-4 fi nal score and
their win was also 5-4.
Over the course of the series,
Ward racked up two sizeable
hits, Harris hit fi ve and Presley
fi nished with either seven or
eight (statistics were not con-
fi rmed). Presley walked away
as the South’s MVP to add yet
another award on his shelf of ac-
complishments in baseball.
It was Geiszler’s fi rst time
coaching in the All-Star series,
and the Sky-Em Coach of the
Year praised the event.
“It was a really great experi-
ence for everyone, especially
the players,” he said. “It was all
done very professionally. They
really made it into a big event,
and it was a big deal.”
The absence of these stars
next year will be noticed within
the baseball team, but Geiszler
has a few other weapons. For
example, Brett Ollivant will re-
turn as a senior after winning
the Sky-Em pitcher of the year
award, and TJ Bellamy showed
potential to be a leader next year
as well.
Photos by Gary Ordway
Hunter Harris (left), Payton Presley (middle) and Lucas Ward (right) all made impacts on the fi eld during Satur-
day's and Sunday's All-Star Series.
Despite injuries, Lions fi nd
success during summer
The Cottage Grove Lions basketball team has
maintained a high rate of success during summer
competition despite being plagued with several in-
juries.
The Lions are 17-2 as they enter the latter part of
their summer season. Leaders such as Kory Parent
and Blake Sentman have missed games due to in-
juries.
Parent, who was the Sky-Em player of the year in
the 2015-2016 season, has yet to play due to a pulled
groin. Sentman has missed several games due to a
poison oak affl iction, and senior Jordan Hagewood
is still out after missing the entire regular season be-
cause of a leg injury.
The injuries and success speak volumes to the Li-
ons' depth. Not only was Parent the Sky-Em Player
of the Year, he also made fi rst-team All State after
leading his team to the state tournament in March.
Parent and Sentman make the bulk of the scoring for
the Lions. Head Coach Donn Pollard says that the in-
juries give other players the opportunity to step up.
“It’s good to get some of the younger guys in there
and get more experience,” he said. Cottage Grove
travels to Willamette tonight (Wednesday) to play a
doubleheader and will be playing in a tournament at
Gonzaga after that.
Kellen Chadwick makes late race pass to win
Wild West Modifi ed Shootout round three
BY BEN DEATHERAGE
For the Sentinel
Photo by Gary Ordway
Kory Parent has yet to play this sum-
mer due to a groin injury.
The Wild West Modifi ed
Shootout was back in the state
of Oregon (after spending the
night before in California) on
Monday, June 13 for the third
round of the tour. Cottage Grove
Speedway hosted and produced
some excellent racing for the
fans in attendance. Forty drivers
made the journey to the quarter-
mile clay oval representing the
states of Oregon, Washington,
California, Montana, North Da-
kota, Colorado, and North Car-
olina as well as the Canadian
province of British Columbia.
Lakewood, Colorado’s Tripp
Gaylord took full advantage of
his pole starting position to get
to the front early in the main
event. Gaylord mastered the
middle of the race track (in only
his fi rst visit), and kept all chal-
lengers at bay for much of the
race. Unfortunately, he wasn’t
able to develop a large lead due
to several cautions occurring in
the fi rst half of the race.
Despite the yellows, the
young Gaylord was good
enough on the restarts to main-
tain the lead and go to work on
creating distance between him-
self and second place. But that
second-place car was the win-
ner from the night before, Kel-
len Chadwick. Chadwick, of
Oakley, California would search
high and low to try and fi nd a
way around the leader, but each
time Gaylord got away.
Eventually Chadwick was
able to pull level with Gaylord
after a lap 26 restart for his fi rst
opportunity to get around the
Coloradan. Kellen was able to
fi nesse the throttle on the bot-
tom of the track to get in front of
Gaylord on lap 27. From there
on out, Chadwick would cruise
the rest of the distance to win
his second straight Wild West
Modifi ed Shootout event of his
career.
Gaylord crossed the wire in
second but unfortunately was
too light at the scales during the
post-race inspection, resulting
in a disqualifi cation. Tripp’s
older brother, Ryan, also out of
Lakewood, Colorado, would in-
herit second, and Albany’s Bri-
cen James fi nished third. Fourth
place belonged to Jesse Wil-
liamson of Eugene, while Col-
len Winebarger fi nished fi fth.
Two B-Mains were ran earlier
in the night, and they were won
by Danny Lauer of Nipomo,
California and Lance Mari from
Imperial, California. In the
Last Chance Qualifi er, Sweet
Home’s Brian Thompson was
the top fi nisher.
Mark Wauge holds on to win Wild West Modifi ed Shootout round four in CG
BY BEN DEATHERAGE
For the Sentinel
Despite several rain showers
over the course of the day, Cot-
tage Grove Speedway was de-
termined to complete the Wild
West Modifi ed Shootout event.
It was the fourth leg of the tour
and the second consecutive eve-
ning at the famed quarter-mile
clay oval. A total of 47 racecars
participated in the night’s action
representing the states of Or-
egon, Washington, California,
Montana, North Dakota, Colo-
rado and North Carolina, as
well as the Canadian province
of British Columbia.
Mark Wauge of the southern
Oregon town of Jacksonville
started the main event on the
inside pole position. He got
to the front on the opening lap
and began to develop a sizable
lead early on. But he wouldn’t
be able to construct too large of
a gap between himself and the
rest of the fi eld due to quite a
few cautions in the fi rst 10 laps.
After a lap seven restart,
Wauge paced the fi eld on a long
green fl ag run. As he started to
catch the tail end of the fi eld he
was briefl y bottled up in some
lapped traffi c. But just as the
challengers were setting them-
selves up to make a move for the
coveted position, a yellow came
out on lap 18.
The second half of the main
event went practically go cau-
tion free. Although lapped traf-
fi c wasn’t a factor, Wauge had a
close call on the fi nal circuit. On
the white-fl ag lap, a car stopped
to a halt in turn four. The fi eld
raced back the yellow, and the
incident forced Wauge to slam
on the brakes and nearly hit the
motionless vehicle.
Wauge and the rest of the fi eld
managed to miss the stopped
car, and he crossed the line to
win his second career Wild West
Modifi ed Shootout victory. It
was the fi rst time since Siskiyou
Motor Speedway in 2013 that
he had won an event with the
series. It also marked the third
occasion that Mark has won a
feature at CGS in 2016.
Chowchilla, California’s Alex
Stanford was scored second,
followed by the Albany teenag-
er Bricen James in third. Nipo-
ma, California chauffeur Danny
Lauer got fourth, while fi nish-
ing in fi fth was Randy Brown of
Chowchilla, California.
Due to the high car count,
three B Mains were ran elimi-
nating entirely the Last Chance
Qualifi er. B Main winners were
Vancouver, Washington’s Don
Jenner, Eric Ashley of Jasper,
and Jake Mayden from Spring-
fi eld.
Courtesy Photo
Mark Wauge won his second career Wild West Modifi ed Shootout after a few close calls at CG Speedway.
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