Sports & recreation
Cottage Grove Sentinel
Wednesday, March 11, 2019
South Lane County Sports and Recreation
Cottage Grove
martial artists
score medals
at regionals
Six martial art students
from Lauraine’s ATA Mar-
tial Arts in Cottage Grove,
Oregon brought home an
array of medals from last
week’s inaugural American
Taekwondo Association
Northwest District Cham-
pionships held in Des
Moines, Washington.
This event was only open
to the top competitors
from Oregon, Washington,
Wyoming, Idaho, Montana
and all of Canada.
“It was exciting me and
my students to receive in-
vitations to compete for the
title,” says fourth degree
black belt and owner Erin
Lauraine. “However, it was
daunting to see how many
states were also included,
especially all of Canada.
We decided to give it our
best, and it paid off.”
The group took in a to-
tal of eight District titles as
well as four silver and two
bronze medal finishes.
Leading the way was
Lauraine who was a gold
medalist in traditional
forms, sparring and tradi-
tional weapons while tak-
ing home a silver medal in
combative weapons spar-
ring. Second degree black
belt Erin Foreman was a
gold medalist in tradition-
al weapons and a silver
medalist in forms while.
Also a second degree black
belt, Audrey Millard was
a bronze medalist in spar-
ring and combative weap-
on sparring.
First degree black belt
Lee Lauraine was a gold
medalist in sparring and
combative weapon spar-
ring. First degree black
belt D.J. Jensen was a gold
medalist in both sparing
and traditional weapons.
Green belt Meilani Pang
finished seventh in spar-
ring.
As an added benefit,
black belt competitors who
took the gold get an invi-
tation to compete for the
World Champion title in
Little Rock, Arkansas next
month.
“This is huge for us.”
says Lauraine’s ATA man-
ager Megan Millard. “The
eight titles we won are
eight chances at a World
title. Just to get this oppor-
tunity usually takes going
to dozens of tournaments
and spending thousands
of dollars, which many of
our families can’t afford.
With this new opportunity,
our students can have that
chance.”
The school has been
fundraising for the past
year to travel to the Amer-
ican Taekwondo Associ-
ation World Champion-
ships in Little Rock, and is
happy to report that all of
their students will be there
to compete for their shot at
a World title.
“We’re the biggest small
school around.” says com-
petitor and gold medalist
Lee Lauraine. “We’re your
classic underdog. People
don’t expect much from
a small town school, but
that’s our greatest strength.
We train hard, support one
another and never give up.”
Section B
Contact Sports, 942-3325 or e-mail zsilva@cgsentinel.com
Warm welcome for first week of games
With the sun in the air, the Cottage Grove baseball team got a chance to be on their field for the first time this season on Monday. On Tuesday the theam had their first
game of the season (after The Sentinel’s print deadline). Top photo: The team huddles around head coach Dan Geiszler on the first sunny day of the season. Left: Senior
Wyatt Sayles works on turning two. Right: Koltin Britton dives for a fly ball.
Elkton’s principal continues success at Days Creek
PHOTO C/O JAMES ELLIS
Days Creek head coach James Ellis and his son, Blake,
share a moment after the Wolves took third place at
the 1A state basketball tournament.
Serving as Days Creek’s basketball coach in
addition to Elkton’s principal and athletic
director, James Ellis successfully navigated
through the winter sports season
By Zach Silva
zsilva@cgsentinel.com
E
ighty-three miles in the morning. Eighty-three
miles in the afternoon.
For James Ellis, 52, the drive from Days
Athletes of
the Week
Creek to Elkton and back has become part of his daily
commute. A time to listen to a variety of music, maybe
throw on a podcast and probably do some thinking.
“Sometimes I don’t listen to anything. Just unwind
and think or prepare my mind for what I’ve got to do,”
said Ellis while sitting in his office in Elkton last week.
In his first year on the job at Elkton, he works at the high
school as both principal and athletic director — not ex-
actly an uncommon pairing of jobs at the 1A level. But
what is uncommon is that Ellis is also the head boys’
basketball coach at Days Creek — a school in the same
league as Elkton — in a position he has held for the last
27 years.
Entering the season, Ellis had plenty of questions and
concerns about what could go wrong as he tried to jug-
gle these responsibilities. But through plenty of hours
logged on the road, community support from both
schools and a tenacious basketball team, Ellis turned
his busy year into one of the most successful seasons in
school history.
urrent Days Creek athletic director Ron Dunn
first learned of James Ellis in the fall of 1982.
Dunn had just started his first year at the
school where he was the boys’ basketball coach. School
was just about to start for the year and a student told
him some bad news about a junior on the basketball
team who was hurt playing football.
“Somebody told me, ‘Mr. Dunn, you’re going to be
sick…one of your best players broke his leg,’” remem-
bers Dunn nearly 40 years later. “Sometime in that first
week of school here comes that little blonde-haired kid
with crutches and a big ol’ cast on his leg.” The pair be-
gan a lifelong friendship in that first year which was aid-
ed by Ellis who regularly bought Dunn ice cream from
the student store.
After graduation the two remained close as Dunn en-
couraged Ellis to get into education and then eventual-
ly helped him get a job at Days Creek. Ellis entered the
C
This week’s athletes of the week are
Erin Lauraine, Lee Lauraine, Audrey
Millard, Erin Foreman, D.J. Jensen
and Meilani Pang of Lauraine’s ATA
Martial Arts. The Cottage Grove
based athletes competed at the
American Taekwondo Association
Northwest District Championships
and brought back a host of awards.
To learn more, see left column.
coaching world of Days Creek as an assistant football
and track and field coach at the high school in addition
to coaching middle school basketball. In 1992 he took
the position of head boys basketball coach.
Ellis got comfortable in the position and before long
had coached the team to one of its best finishes in school
history as the team placed second in state in both 2000
and 2001. Since Ellis has been at Days Creek, the Wolves
have made it to the quarterfinals of the state tournament
11 times (1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2006, 2009, 2011,
2012, 2014, 2017, 2019). While the team maintained a
high level of success on the court, off the court Ellis be-
gan working on getting his administrative license.
In the winter of 2018, Ellis was approached by Elk-
ton about the possibility of taking the role of principal.
Flattered by being considered, Ellis initially brushed it
aside saying the timing wasn’t right and that maybe in
the future he would consider. After nearly three decades
as head basketball coach at Days Creek, Ellis was not
going to leave during his son’s — Skyline player of the
year Blake Ellis — senior season. Those at Elkton were
insistent that he was the one for the job and after going
through the interview process and discussing logistics,
an agreement was met: Ellis would be principal and
athletic director at Elkton while still coaching at Days
Creek.
“I had my concerns at the beginning, but I will tell
you… the staff members at both schools allowed this to
work pretty seamlessly,” said Ellis. “I kept saying, there
are going to be problems that arise that I can’t even
imagine. But those were minimal.”
In Elkton, there was an understanding that Ellis
would leave school an hour or two early while mak-
ing up hours on Fridays throughout the year. In Days
Creek, he had assistant coaches in place that were ready
in the off-chance he had to stay late. The closest thing to
a problem came when discussing upcoming schedules.
ELLIS see B2
PHOTO C/O LAURAINE'S
ATA MARTIAL ARTS