Polk County Sports
Polk County Itemizer-Observer • February 15, 2017 13A
Dragons: Dallas has four district champions
Continued from Page 11A
“I knew it was going to be a
tough match,” Treve said. “I knew
he wanted it really badly because
it’s his senior year. ... (Winning)
means a lot. It’s nice to go up a
weight class and be successful, it
feels really good.”
Winning alongside his brother
was something he yearned for.
“It’s awesome,” Treve said. “I
want to be like him. It’s fun to win
during his senior year.”
Janssen, who earned a 9-3 deci-
sion over Woodburn’s Karson
Christiansen in the finals, saw the
culmination of the hard work and
support from all those around
him.
“It meant a ton to me,” Janssen
said. “I’ve had a lot of support from
my family and my teammates. I
felt like I had to do whatever it
took.”
Ryan Bibler (106) and Clay
Coxen (182) finished second.
Dawson Barcroft (113), Joseph
Foster (126), Bryce Miller (132),
Joseph English (138) and
Nicholas Nelson (152) took third,
and Devon Floyd (160) placed
fourth.
The top four wrestlers in each
weight class advanced to state.
While the Dragons enjoyed their
district championship, they know
their work is far from finished.
The state wrestling champi-
onships will be on Feb. 24-25 at
Veterans Memorial Coliseum in
Portland.
For some, like Tanner, who took
second at state last season, this is a
final opportunity to bring home an
individual title.
“I still have unfinished busi-
ness,” he said.
But the Dragons also know they
have a chance to challenge for the
team title.
“We’ll have about the same
number as the Hermistons and
Redmonds,” Dallas coach Tony
Olliff said. “Crater will have
more, but I think they will have a
lot tougher first day than we
will.”
For those moving on to state, the
focus remains on fine tuning.
“Whatever your kryptonite
might have been, you have to work
on it,” Janssen said. “We have to
find our weaknesses and eliminate
them.”
For Olliff, the weeks leading up
to state means keeping wrestlers
healthy, and mentally and physi-
cally prepared for a grueling two-
day tournament.
“I think we have to vary the
schedule and style of workout so
it doesn’t become mundane,” Ol-
liff said. “It’s not about three
rounds anymore. There’s going to
LUKAS EGGEN/ Itemizer-Observer
Dallas’ Treve Earhart, left, defeated Central’s Sam Crow in the district finals on Saturday evening.
be a lot of overtime matches at
state. You have to know going
into an OT match that you have
what it takes. We have to put
them in that situation and have
them be able to function in those
lung burning situations.”
Dallas entered the district
championships with high expecta-
tions. The Dragons didn’t disap-
point.
They’re hoping for a similarly
strong showing at state.
“We all have to do what we can,”
Janssen said. “We have to do our
part to get us close to a state title
and put ourselves in the best situa-
tion we can.”
PERRYDALE ROUNDUP
Boys, girls basketball prep for postseason
Itemizer-Observer staff report
PERRYDALE — Perry-
dale’s boys and girls basket-
ball teams are headed to the
postseason.
They face very different
paths to the state playoffs.
The boys team won the
Casco League regular season
title, earning an automatic
spot to the league tourna-
ment title game on Saturday
at Corban University.
They will face the winner
of Crosshill Christian vs.
Willamette Valley Christian.
Both teams in the title game
advance to state. The winner
gets the higher seed at state
— something that could be
of critical importance given
the quality of teams the Pi-
rates could face.
“We had a meeting on
Monday to talk about the
importance of what they are
facing,” boys coach Brian
Domes said. “Saturday is a
setup for what we’re trying
to do. We told the seniors
that if and when they play
their last game, it will be
their last of high school. We
want the young kids to un-
derstand, yeah you get to
play next year, but you won’t
get to play with this caliber
of a team. We want them to
understand how hard we
need to push the next cou-
ple of weeks.”
Domes said the plan was
to go hard for a couple days
and look at film from the
team’s three losses — a re-
minder that nothing is a
given.
“We want to remind them
Casco League Tournament
• The Casco League Tournament will take place Friday and
Saturday at Corban University.
• Games will begin each day at 2 p.m. with scheduled start
times following at 4 p.m., 6 p.m. and 8 p.m.
• Falls City’s boys team will play Livingstone Adventist Friday
at 2 p.m. The winner advances to the third-place game on Sat-
urday. The loser is eliminated.
• Falls City’s girls team will play the fourth seed with winner
advancing to the third place game and the loser eliminated.
• Perrydale’s boys clinched a spot in the league title game.
• Perrydale’s girls team will enter the league tournament as
the third or fourth seed.
that you guys are beatable,”
Domes said. “You don’t just
get to show up and expect it
to happen.”
GIRLS
The girls team’s spot in
the league tournament is
clinched. But what seed they
will enter as remains up in
the air. Jewell played Living-
stone Adventist on Monday
and faced Oregon School for
the Deaf Tuesday after press
time.
A pair of wins by Jewell
would force a tiebreaker
game against Perrydale at
Gaston High School
Wednesday (today) at 4:30
p.m. The winner would
enter the league tournament
as the third seed with the
loser would enter as the
fourth seed.
If Jewell loses to Oregon
School for the Deaf, the Pi-
rates clinch the third seed.
At the league tournament,
the winner of the second
seed/third seed matchup
clinches a spot at state and
advances to the league tour-
nament title game.
The loser plays the winner
of the fourth seed/fifth seed
matchup with a spot at state
on the line.
For now, Perrydale will
prepare as though a
matchup against Jewell on
Wednesday is looming.
Either way, the Pirates will
enter the league tournament
needing at least one more
victory to clinch a spot to
state.
“If we play against Jew-
e l l , w h a t we w i l l r u n
against Jewell will be the
same thing that we run
against Willamette Valley
Christian or Crosshill
Christian,” girls coach
Terry Newton said. “I’ve ex-
plained to the girls that
they need to be ready for
playoff basketball. The
good thing about this team
is they’re highly competi-
tive as a group. They’ve all
had a fair amount of suc-
cess in basketball and
they’ve been playing for al-
most four months now.
They’ve gained a lot of ex-
perience.”
FALLS CITY ROUNDUP
Boys basketball earns a pair of victories
Itemizer-Observer staff report
FALLS CITY — Falls City’s
boys basketball team ended
the regular season with a
pair of wins, beating C.S.
Lewis 58-47 on Friday and
Jewell 60-37 on Saturday.
Jeremy Labrado scored a
team-high 18 points against
C.S. Lewis. Austin Burgess
added 14 points and Zach
Varney scored 11 points. The
Mountaineers shot 20 for 26
from the free-throw line.
Labrado scored 16 points
against Jewell. Dylan Young
and Varney each scored 14
points.
“Dylan Young has really
played well the last two
games,” coach Micke Kidd
said. “He’s really stepping up
in leadership and in his of-
fensive and defensive ef-
forts.”
The boys opened the
week with a 47-37 loss to
Willamette Valley Christian
on Feb. 7.
The boys open the Casco
League Tournament Friday
at Corban University. The
fifth-seeded Mountaineers
will play fourth-seeded Liv-
ingstone Adventist at 2:45
p.m. The winner advances to
play the loser of No. 2
Crosshill Christian vs. No. 3
Willamette Valley Christian
on Saturday.
The winner of Saturday’s
game advances to state.
GIRLS
Falls City’s girls basketball
team fell to Willamette Val-
ley Christian 54-30 on Feb. 7
and Jewell 33-16 on Satur-
day.
The Mountaineers enter
the Casco League Tourna-
ment as the fifth seed and
will face the fourth seed Fri-
day at 4 p.m. The winner ad-
vances to play the loser of
Willamette Valley Christian
vs/Perrydale/Jewell on Sat-
urday. The loser is eliminat-
ed.
The winner of Saturday’s
game advances to state.
Central: Panthers see three Panthers defeat
wrestlers make district finals Crescent Valley
PREP BASKETBALL
Continued from Page 11A
Sam Crow (195) and Caleb
Sedlacek (285) placed sec-
ond.
“Our three finalists have
not only grown as wrestlers,
they have also grown as
leaders,” coach Van Holstad
said. “They have dealt with
success and failure with dig-
nity and humility.”
Sedlacek felt that the mo-
ment got to him in the dis-
trict finals, but is ready to
learn from the experience.
“I was super nervous,”
Sedlacek said. “I let the
crowd get to me a little bit
and got caught in the mo-
ment more than I should
have, but making it to state
means a lot. One of my goals
was to make it to state and
rock it at state.”
Noah Worthington (106)
and Chris Polanco (160) fin-
ished third and AJ Morales
(170) and Erik Vasquez (182)
took fourth.
Polanco’s journey to state
has been a long one.
Polanco, a senior, earned
a 6-4 decision over Dallas’
Devon Floyd to take third. A
year ago, Polanco lost to
teammate Gabriel Arreguin
in the fourth-place match at
districts.
Arreguin advanced to
state. Polanco did not.
This season, with his last
chance to go to state, noth-
ing would stop him.
“Everything was at stake,”
Polanco said. “I lost my
semifinals match. I got fired
up. To face a Dallas wrestler,
it’s two rival teams. It was all
on the line.”
With his first trip to state
secured, Polanco is excited
to experience the competi-
tion first hand.
“It’s not just about the
wrestling,” Polanco said. “It’s
everything. It’s the atmos-
phere. It’s a nice feeling (to
know I’m going).”
But all of the Panthers’
qualifiers aren’t satisfied
with simply making state.
“(Districts felt pretty
good),” Worthington said.
“… Now I want to get top
three at state.”
The Panthers finished
fifth in the team standings.
“For the most part, we did
LUKAS EGGEN/ Itemizer-Observer
Central senior David Negrete won his second-straight
district title on Friday and Saturday.
just about how we expect-
ed,” Holstad said. “Of
course, we wanted a better
team finish and more quali-
fying wrestlers, but we were
competitive.”
Now, the attention turns
toward state when Holstad
said they will maintain a reg-
ular schedule to maintain
their peak.
The Panthers didn’t quite
send as many wrestlers to
state as they had hoped, but
Holstad said he was proud
of the way each wrestler bat-
tled over the weekend.
“As always, we wanted
more to qualify, but seven
isn’t a bad number to take to
state out of a very tough dis-
trict tournament,” Holstad
said. “Unfortunately we
have to leave a few kids who
have worked very hard to
make big improvements
home, but are proud of
them none theless.”
Itemizer-Observer staff report
INDEPENDENCE — Central’s girls
basketball team defeated Crescent Valley
49-23 on Feb. 8 before falling to
Wilsonville 53-45 on Saturday.
Elizabeth Chavez scored a game-high
18 points against Crescent Valley. Mea-
gan Mendazona added 16 points and 12
rebounds.
Mendazona scored a game-high 21
Chavez
points against Wilsonville and Chavez
recorded 14 points.
The Panthers host Lebanon Wednesday (today) at 7 p.m.
before playing at Dallas Friday at 5:30 p.m. and at Corvallis
on Feb. 22 at 7 p.m.
Central enters the week in fourth place in the Mid-
Willamette Conference.