B
S PORTS
Section B
Elks earn
another win
Wednesday, December 13, 2017
South Lane County Sports and Recreation
Contact Sports, 942-3325 or e-mail zsilva@cgsentinel.com
Lions outmatched by top-tier talent
By Zach Silva
After a minute of play the
Elkton girls basketball team had
scored seven points; their op-
ponents from Mohawk scored
their seventh point late in the
third quarter.
It was another big win for the
Elks (4-1) as they won 55-26. It
was their fourth win in which
the margin of victory was over
25 points.
“I don’t know if it would be a
big win, just a win. We did play
well, though,” said Elkton head
coach Rob Parker. “We got the
fast break going early and that’s
always nice. I like the fact that
we were seeing open players
and we were looking down the
court. But you know, it’s hard to
judge games like that with how
you’re really doing. They get to
be too easy.”
Their success from the start
was predicated on their full-
court pressure. The Elks were
relentless in their attack. Each
steal turned into open layups.
And when the layups were
missed, the Elks were still there
each time to get the board. Elk-
ton had 19 steals on the game
and outrebounded the Mus-
tangs 52-26. Hannah Maxwell
led the team with 18 points, 12
rebounds and six steals. Kieryn
Carnes added 12 points and
Alexis Halstead had 11.
“We missed too many [lay-
ups]. A lot of that is we’re
looking to sophomores and
they’re missing a lot of those
shots. They’re still sophomores.
They’re not used to getting
that ball inside and going up
and someone is hitting them or
bumping them,” said Parker.
“It’s totally different. They
come out and they go, ‘Well I
got fouled, that’s why I missed
it,’ and I go, ‘Well, you didn’t
get fouled, you got bumped.’”
Elkton’s biggest lead of the
game was when they were up
41 points late in the third quar-
ter. With a lead, the Elks got to
play around with different line-
ups throughout the game.
“We had a lot of players that
maybe wouldn’t have normally
got a lot of playing time, get a
lot of playing time. And we’re
mixing, we’re mixing different
players and I actually have play-
ers playing other positions than
they normally would play,” said
Parker.
On Friday night, the Elks
defeated Triangle Lake 54-20.
Maxwell led the team with 17
points.
Warriors can't
stop Wynn, lose
By Zach Silva
zsilva@cgsentinel.com
The North Douglas boys’
basketball team had a front row
view of the Parker Wynn show
last Saturday.
Wynn, who dominated the
game for Triangle Lake from
the start, fi nished with 29 points
and led the Lakers to a 56-47
victory over North Douglas at
the Elkton Tip-Off Classic. It
was North Douglas’ fi rst loss of
the season.
“We were playing good D on
[Wynn] and he was just shoot-
ing over us,” said North Doug-
las head coach Tyler Vancil.
“We tried. We said, hey, don’t
give him any space, told the oth-
er guys to help out and I mean,
like I said we were playing up,
our guys were doing a great job
playing in his face and he just
pulled up over them. And the
basket was huge for him and
he just wasn’t missing. I don’t
know what else you can do, he
was hitting everything tonight.”
Down fi ve late in the fi rst
quarter, it was the Warriors’
Caleb Parks who changed the
momentum for North Douglas.
NORTH DOUGLAS cont. B
PHOTO BY CG SENTINEL/ZACH SILVA
Cottage Grove's Tara Child starts the fast break for the Lions last Friday at Cascade High School.
By Zach Silva
zsilva@cgsentinel.com
For the second time in a week, it was one bad stretch
of play against a good team that took the Cottage
Grove girls basketball out of the game.
After falling in their opener to Marshfi eld, who fi n-
ished the regular season ranked third last year, the Li-
ons lost to Cascade, who fi nished the regular season
ranked fi rst a season ago.
“Well, we started off with probably two top fi ve
teams in state at least,” said head coach Kevin Yoss.
“I’m encouraged. I think that we saw two good
teams that we want to try to emulate and as soon as we
can do that I think we’ll be successful.”
Against the Pirates on the road last Tuesday, it was
an imposing 10-0 run in the second quarter and in the
fourth quarter that put Marshfi eld in control of the
game and win 46-29. Matty Ladd led Cottage Grove
with 12 points.
On Friday night at Cascade, an uninspiring fi rst
quarter of play saw the Cougars with a 5-4 lead over
Cottage Grove. As the game gained offensive fl ow, the
back and forth game saw the Cougars with 19-17 lead
at the half. It was in the third quarter that the Cougars
put the game out of reach with a 9-2 run that the Lions
were unable to battle back from.
“We still turned the ball over way too much. That’s,
I think, our Achilles heel. That’s been our top goal our
last two games to take care of the ball. When we do
that, we have stretches when we do that and we’re very
successful and we can beat them but when we don’t,
you get that 10-0 run that you’re talking about and
that’s the difference,” said Yoss.
Down nine in the early moments of the fourth quar-
ter, it was a coach’s nightmare when a missed Cascade
shot rimmed out, hit the ground and the Lions were
unable to get the board that promptly turned into a
Cougar made-three pointer.
“Everybody’s watching, waiting for somebody else
to do it and we need to have more players take the ini-
tiative to do it themselves,” said Yoss.
As the game, like many Cottage Grove posses-
sions, slipped out of reach, the Lions began hoisting
up three pointers that were going in. The Lions shot
fi ve-of-eleven for three on the game. Samantha May
and Madison Bethke each had two threes for Cottage
Grove. Miakela Blomquist led the team with 10 points
and Ladd had seven.
When asked if the team was hesitant to shoot, Yoss
noted that it is a work in progress.
“I think part of that’s accurate. Part of it’s that they
played us in a little bit of a different defense at the end,
they were sitting in a zone but we aren’t aggressive
enough and I told the girls that we have to be aggres-
sive especially when they are pressuring us to get to
PHOTO BY CG SENTINEL/ZACH SILVA
As teammate Reilly Kelty is double-teamed, a wide-open
Madison Bethke jumps in the air and calls for the ball on
Friday night.
the rim. But we do, we look to pass before we look to
shoot and so, that’s something else we need to fi x,” he
said.
Lions fall in
fi rst games
By Zach Silva
zsilva@cgsentinel.com
The Cottage Grove boys began their season last
weekend with a pair of losses on the road.
Under the tutelage of fi rst year head coach Nick Fin-
ley, the Lions opened their season at Cascade on Fri-
day night with a 58-53 loss.
From the fi rst moments of the game it was clear that
the Lions are a team that is going to work to fast break
teams, get loose balls and shoot threes. The Lions were
in a six-point hole early but willed themselves back
through Juice Clafl in getting back on defense to force
Cougar misses, a Jesse Ellingsworth recording a block
and Erick Giffen taking charges on back-to-back pos-
sessions. A late surge in the second quarter game the
Cougars a 31-23 halftime advantage.
“Effort was there. Totally. The effort on the loose
balls, I don’t know how many 50-50 balls we ended up
with but most of them. I know at halftime we account-
ed for pretty much all of the 50-50 balls. And even in
the second half, they were just scrappy. So the effort
was there. I think the nerves got us early on,” said Fin-
ley.
As the Lions turned the ball over and were called for
sloppy fouls, the Cougars continued to build their lead.
“The offi ciating was fi ne but we have to adjust to
the offi ciating and we didn’t. We continued to foul and
Athlete of
the Week
Cottage Grove's Markus Julien squares up on defense against Cascade on Friday night.
we never adjusted,” said Finley with a diplomatic re-
sponse.
Throughout the game, there were calls that gave
pause to the Lions' faithful. One in particular that was
when a Cascade player passed an alley-oop to a team
mate and was fouled on the pass but was awarded free
throws for being in the act of shooting. The player
snickered as he walked to the line.
“There was that one and then there was one, what
did he say, the other coach made the call. Yeah well,
can I have a call? Can I have a couple calls? Let me
make some,” said Finley.
Doing what they do best, hustling, the Lions were
able to claw their way back in. A DeJean Alonzo div-
ing save set up a Trenton Grover three, one of his fi ve
on the night. And what had been an eight point lead
was down to three heading into the fourth quarter. The
This week's athlete of the week
was Elkton's Hannah Maxwell.
On Friday she led her team with
17 points and on Saturday added
18 points, 12 rebounds and six
steals for the Elks.
PHOTO BY CG SENTINEL/ZACH SILVA
Cougars made an early run and got back to a nine-
point lead and it was too much for the Lions.
“We just haven’t had time to do the little things,”
said Finley who has put in new defensive and offen-
sive schemes in the nine practices that the group has
been together. “You know, rotation on defense. How
we’re going to handle on-ball screens, what are we go-
ing to do coming off on-ball screens, the little things
that we can correct, we’re going to correct. And we’re
going to be just fi ne.”
“It was the fi rst game of the year and we want to
make sure we’re playing our best basketball in March
not December.”
On Saturday, the team travelled to Marshfi eld where
they lost 64-48. The Lions were outrebounded 44-32
and had 19 turnovers. Ellingworth led the team with
12 points.
CYAN MAGENTA YELLOW BLACK
zsilva@cgsentinel.com