B
S PORTS
Wednesday, October 19, 2016
Section B
South Lane County Sports and Recreation
Contact Sports, 942-3325 or e-mail sports@cgsentinel.com
Girls' water polo routs North Eugene;
boys fi ght hard with a lack of depth
The girls' team took
care of business in
a 20-6 victory, but
the boys struggled
against a very
stacked North
Eugene team
BY SAM WRIGHT
The Cottage Grove Sentinel
The Aqua Lions have recently
fi nished their season with strong
results from both the boys’ and
girls’ teams. Cottage Grove
water polo has seen a huge im-
provement over the years, and
for the girls, Thursday’s per-
formance against North Eugene
put an exclamation mark on a
dominant season.
It was senior night for Cot-
tage Grove and a very impor-
tant one for the girls’ squad, as
the team features seniors who
have played together since their
freshman year.
Tori Raade, Emma Meyers,
Clover Rudicel, Sophia Edel-
bute and Madisen Kelty have
been teammates since they fi rst
made the varsity water polo
team four years ago. Since then,
the team has shown a great in-
cline in performance. During
their freshman year, the current
seniors were lucky to win one
game all season, and now they
have won almost every game
except a few losses to strong
teams like South Albany.
The girls’ team dominated
North Eugene on Thursday in
a 20-6 rout. Scores like this
haven’t been rare this season for
the Aqua Lions. Cottage Grove
has managed to consistently
score well above 15 points,
while keeping its opponent’s
scores well under 10.
Photo by Sam Wright
Austyn Carey reaches to defend a North Eugene player on Thursday.
The most outstanding win
would be a 23-5 beating of Med-
ford followed by a 10-2 victory
over Churchill directly after.
Based on scores like these,
Head Coach Tyson Pilling isn’t
lying when he says that defense
is the number-one priority for
his teams.
“A good defense will always
give you a good offense,” Pill-
ing said. Their blowout scores
can attest to his strategy.
There have been a few games
that the Lions have let slip.
Teams like South Albany and
Ashland have been able to top-
ple the dominant Cottage Grove
team.
The Aqua Lions’ fi rst encoun-
ter with South Albany resulted
in a 15-6 loss, but last Tuesday
they put up a much stronger
fi ght and lost 12-11 in a thrilling
match.
Thursday’s match was the last
time the seniors got to put on
their Lions caps at the Warren
Lions roll Bulldogs,
prepare for Elmira
Cottage Grove’s Sky-Em domi-
nance in Football continued as they
rolled over Sutherlin 57-0 on Friday.
The Lions now prepare for perhaps
their toughest league opponent,
though recent weeks have shown
weaknesses in the Elmira football
team.
Even if the Elmira Falcons pull off
an upset on Friday, Cottage Grove
will hold on to a Sky-Em champion-
ship. The worst-case scenario is that
Cottage Grove loses to Elmira and
Sisters beats Sweet Home (the latter
will probably happen). Even then,
Cottage Grove and Sisters will be 4-
1, and the Lions have the tiebreaker
over the Outlaws with the 34-22 vic-
tory at the end of September.
The best-case scenario is that the
Lions go 5-0 in the Sky-Em League
and 8-0 overall, capturing a perfect
regular season. While it seems many
of these games have been a breeze
for the Lions, Head Coach Gary
Roberts and his team aren’t letting
up on the hard work. In fact, it may
be because the team has yet to be tru-
ly tested that the Lions are working
hard to ensure they don’t get caught
fl at-footed. Roberts believes that
the team has yet to secure a signa-
ture home win, though the win over
Scappoose was a very newsworthy
game. Aside from that 24-21 win,
Cottage Grove has beaten every op-
ponent by two scores or more. Five
out of the seven games played so far
have been decided by 42 points or
more. Now Cottage Grove looks to
unleash the same wrath against the
Falcons this Friday.
During the fi rst half of the sea-
son, it looked like Elmira would be
a league rival for the Sky-Em title,
but recent weeks may have Falcons’
Head Coach Justin Peeler a little
more concerned now.
The Falcons suffered their fi rst lost
on Oct. 7. A devastating 27-3 loss
to Sisters was the start of Elmira’s
derailment. Then, as the Lions ran
away with their rout over Sutherlin,
Sweet Home managed to take down
the Falcons, 13-10.
The two losses could make the
Falcons a dangerous team. Cottage
Grove will be going head-on against
a team that started off 5-0 and will
do everything in its power to avoid
fi nishing 5-3.
H. Daugherty Aquatic Center.
“It’s just their experience and
ability to work as a team and be-
ing able to communicate prop-
erly,” Pilling said of the girls’
team.
The boys’ team has also vast-
ly improved since last year, al-
though it hasn’t seen such domi-
nating results as the girls.
The Cottage Grove boys’
team lost 7-3 against North Eu-
gene, but these Aqua Lions have
a huge issue that Pilling says
they’ve been able to overcome
fairly well. The boys’ team only
has seven players, meaning
that they don’t have the ability
to substitute and rest players.
North Eugene outnumbered
Cottage Grove more than two
to one.
But the extra strain on the
players is something both Cot-
tage Grove teams are used to.
“We’ve always been about
conditioning and ‘swimming
them down,’” Pilling said. Ev-
ery player on the team is fi t and
conditioned enough to play a
full four quarters without a sub-
stitution break.
“What they’ve done for only
having seven players is incred-
ible,” Pilling said.
The boys’ team says farewell
to only two seniors this year:
Seth Chambers and Ian Miller.
Athletes of the Week
Girls' water polo team ends season on a high note
The Cottage Grove Aqua Lions have fi nished off a dominant season with a variety of blowout victories.
Many of the seniors have been playing together since they were freshman, and their veteran experience
has brought the team a lot of success this year.
Lions, Tigers and weather:
Cottage Grove struggles vs. JC
Boys' soccer dismantles Sutherlin and weather made Junction City a more
diffi cult opponent
It’s been a crazy season for
the Sky-Em League in boys’
soccer. There has been a lot of
upsets and ties throughout the
league, and Cottage Grove, too,
has had its fair share of strange
games.
The fi rst game last week was
an exception, however, as the
Lions beat Sutherlin 7-0. This
was an outcome that could be
expected, as Cottage Grove
beat Sutherlin 6-0 in their fi rst
matchup a few weeks earlier.
But while Tuesday’s victory
came easy, Thursday’s loss was
a disappointing battle against
Junction City.
Weather had an immense ef-
fect on the game. The torren-
tial rain and heavy winds had
impacts on shots and passes.
Goals were made that normally
wouldn’t have been made and
the game slowed down.
Junction City opened up with
a goal early in the fi rst half. It
was a deep shot, and with the
wind at the Tigers’ back, the
weather helped push the ball to
the back of the net.
Similarly, Cottage Grove re-
sponded with a deep shot by
Jesus Urenda. The ball initially
appeared to be going over the
goal, but a headwind drove the
ball down just over the goalie
to tie the game. But weather fa-
vored Junction City, and the Ti-
gers were able to squeeze in one
more goal before the end of the
fi rst half. Neither team scored
again, and Cottage Grove suf-
fered a 2-1 loss.
“They made the right choice
by picking the side with the wind
at their backs,” Head Coach
Vern Stewart said. The Lions
maintained possession of the
ball in Tiger territory for most
of the second half, but Junction
City dropped back to a six-man
defense and the Lions couldn’t
fi nd the back of the net.
“I think we ended up pan-
icking,” Stewart said. Cottage
Grove entered the game view-
ing it as a must-win situation,
and when the fi nal whistle blew,
disappointment set in.
“It was hard to get a pulse; the
weather was just so atrocious
and everyone just wanted to go
home, I couldn’t get a feel for
individual attitudes,” Stewart
said. Despite the disappointing
loss, the Lions have maintained
a strong attitude throughout oth-
er tough periods of the season.
By Sam Wright
Jesus Chuy Urenda fi ghts through a Junction City defender and torrential downpour.