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About Cottage Grove sentinel. (Cottage Grove, Or.) 1909-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 28, 2019)
Cottage Grove Sentinel Sports & Recreation SOUTH LANE COUNTY SPORTS AND RECREATION Bricen James Wins 2019 Mark Howard Memorial Modifi ed Nationals • • WEDNESDAY | AUGUST 28, 2019 B1 CONTACT SPORTS REPORTER NICK SNYDER AT 942-3325 OR NSNYDER@CGSENTINEL.COM Grovers come out to meet their lions By Ben Deatherage Cottage Grove Speedway Saturday, August 24 was the second and fi nal night of the 2019 Mark Howard Memorial Mod- ifi ed Nationals. Over 44 drivers from Oregon and Washington competed in the Mohawk Metal IMCA Modifi eds during the weekend and pro- duced some excellent re- sults. Stellar action also came from the two other divisions on the card, the IMCA Sport Mods and 360 Sprints. Bricen James managed to take full advantage of his inside front-row start- ing position and put his mount in front of the rest of the fi eld to lead the fi rst lap. Despite the Al- bany ace pacing the fi eld, he had some fast compa- ny try and overtake him. It would be cautions ga- lore in the fi rst half of the race with six stoppages in the fi rst 26 circuits. The frequent stops took lapped traffi c out of the picture. That was until the second half of the main event when it was an all-out battle for the top spot. James briefl y lost the lead with a handful of laps remaining until he quickly reclaimed the position on the next cor- ner. Bricen held all chal- lengers at bay to win his fi rst career Mark Howard Memorial Modifi ed Na- tionals. He is the seventh different driver to have had the honor of accom- plishing such a rare feat. It is also his fourth win of the season at CGS which now ties him for the most wins in the class this year. Collen Winebarger, of Corbett, was a re- spectable second despite running down and chal- lenging the leader for the vast majority of the main event. Klamath Falls’ Nick Trenchard fi nished second, and Nikki Biehn owned entry on the po- dium with a third-place result. The top fi ve was rounded out by Bend native Chad Groves, in fourth and fi fth fi nishing B.J. Wild, of Redmond. It was non-stop ac- tion in the IMCA Sport Mod feature. Vancou- ver, Washington’s Tanner Krohling set the tone ear- ly and was the trailblazer for the fi rst seven laps. Isaac Sanders, of Brook- ings, managed to make it around Krohling on lap eight and pulled away for the rest of the fi eld. Sanders showed a lot of speed but had his hands full in the last couple of laps. Jorddon Braaten managed to make a fi nal lap gamble to beat Isaac to the line and pick up the victory. It is the fourth win for Braaten at “The Grove” this, year which ties him for the most wins at the famed quarter-mile clay oval. Braaten also swept the weekend by winning both nights. Isaac Sander fi nished in second while Tan- ner Krohiling ended his night in third. Roseburg’s Jordan Henry got fourth See SPEEDWAY 2A PHOTO BY NICK SNYDER/CG SENTINEL Student athletes from all the fall sports (football, volleyball, boys soccer and girls soccer, boys and girls cross-country, water polo and cheer) line up to introduce themselves to local fans. Fall sports kick off at CG High School exhibition event By Nick Snyder nsnyder@cgsentinel.com There are always a few telltale signs that fall is coming. The tem- perature has yet to drop, the leaves have yet to change, but fall sports are undoubtedly on their way. On the evening of Friday, Aug. 23 it was the local community’s annu- al opportunity to preview Cottage Grove High School fall athletics at the Meet the Lions event put on by the school’s athletic department. All in all, seven teams - football, volleyball, girls and boys soccer, girls and boys cross-country and cheer - took to the high school’s athletic facilities for team photos and exhibition scrimmages, giving attendees eager for the sports sea- son to begin their first look. There was a palpable theme of new beginnings and opportunities for both coaches and players alike. While most other Cottage Grove coaches are returning for the 2019 season, for new head football coach Chad Smith, this was his first expe- rience at a Meet the Lions event. “It’s been crazy just because this is my first time and, for a lot of the coaches, this is their first time be- cause we only had two guys coming back coaching-wise … so it’s just new and it’s hectic but, you know, we’re making it through and I know it’s a special event for the players and the community so we want to make sure that we continue that,” said Smith when asked about tak- ing on this exhibition event for the first time. “We did a little bit of a dress re- hearsal this morning. We split up the teams as evenly as possible and we’re just going to play as much like a game as possible. So that’ll be good to see. We got a little bit of a practice in this morning so hopefully it’ll be smooth under the big lights,” added Smith just a few hours before the football team took center-stage under the evening sta- dium lights for the first time this year. Smith may be new to the Cottage Grove sidelines, but the other fall coaches return and, in the makeup of their rosters, they almost uni- formly see reason for excitement heading into the first September games. “A whole bunch of incoming freshmen are doing [cross-coun- try] with their choice this fall, more ninth graders than I’ve ever had so the help from them makes this a team right now of 42, which is the biggest team I’ve had by seven at the beginning of the season … and maybe before the start of the year more will join us,” said cross-coun- try coach Jim Settelmeyer when asked about his roster. A number of Cottage Grove teams have seen recent success - a football championship in 2017 and a 2018 second place state finish in volleyball, amongst others - often born on the shoulders of experi- enced upperclassmen, but such is the game in high school sports where graduating seniors remains a constant inevitability. An influx of youth athletes and the growth of former underclassmen, however, means these teams remain in good hands. “[Last year’s freshmen] returned with some real dedication. It was mostly freshman I saw, or this year’s sophomores that I saw over the summer that would come to the events that we would do for condi- tioning and stuff. There’s great lead- ership emerging from that group but we’ve got a couple wonderful leaders on both the boys and the girls team of seniors,” Settelmeyer continued. The head cross-country coach was certainly not alone in this ob- servation and his sentiments were echoed by both third-year girls soccer coach, Reed Levings, and her boys team counterpart, Vern Stewart. “Last year, I think I only had two freshmen come in, but this year I See LIONS 2A From the South Valley to South Africa Local wrestler Adelle Kent represents Oregon on trip to Africa By Nick Snyder nsnyder@cgsentinel.com PHOTO C/O CHRISTINA AND ADELLE KENT Adelle Kent snaps a photo with a statue of Mahatma Gandhi during her trip to South Africa. Athlete of the Week Sports have an ability to bring humanity together on an global stage, from the Olympics to the World Cup, and one local athlete just returned from her first taste of international travel and com- petition. Cottage Grove High School wrestler Adelle Kent arrived home in Cottage Grove on August 15 from a three-and-a-half-week trip to South Africa. Kent, along with 23 other boys and girls wres- tlers, won the right to represent the state of Oregon in the Oregon Wrestling Association’s (OWA) annual Cultural Exchange pro- gram. The OWA’s program has now been running for over 50 years and has sent Oregon youth wres- Th is week’s athletes of the week are the members of the CGHS water polo team who are patiently awaiting the debut of the new Warren H. Daugherty Aquatic Center. tlers all over the globe to places like Russia, Switzerland, New Zea- land, Japan and now South Africa. This year’s participants qualified for their place in the program at a March 8 tournament in Sweet Home, Ore. “Instead of getting a medal for winning, you got to go on this three-and-a-half-week trip to Af- rica. So we just kind of wrestled all over the country. A lot of it was sightseeing too, but it was mostly wrestling,” said Kent. For a wrestler already as ac- complished as Kent as an incom- ing high school junior - and for someone yet to have their first travel experience outside the U.S. - the trade-off of a trip for a medal was a unique opportunity and her company on the trip represented much of Oregon’s best. All partic- ipants either placed in state cham- pionship tournaments or were the eventual champions and their See AFRICA 3A Water polo players look on at the Meet the Lions event. PHOTO BY SOPHIA EDEL- BLUTE/CG SENTINEL