A6 BAKER CITY HERALD • THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2022
SPORTS
BAKER GIRLS BASKETBALL
Bulldogs shrug off slow
start, roll past La Grande
Baker clinches
regular season
Greater Oregon
League title
LA GRANDE (25)
Shorts 4 5-6 13, Collman 1
1-3 4, Strand 0 0-0 0, Jensen
0 0-0 0, Kump 0 0-0 0, Wilson
0 0-0 0, Wilcox 1 0-2 2, Neer 1
0-1 2, Smith 0 0-0 0, A. Dun-
lap 2 0-0 4. Totals 9 6-12 25.
BY JAYSON JACOBY
jjacoby@bakercityherald.com
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Baker’s Brooklyn Jaca shoots against La Grande on Tuesday, Feb. 8,
2022, in the Baker gym.
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Baker’s Rylee Elms, center, is surrounded by La Grande’s Grace Neer,
left, and Makenna Shorts during the Bulldogs’ 43-25 win on Tuesday,
Feb. 8, 2022, in the Baker gym.
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Baker’s Brooklyn Jaca, background, and Macey Moore during the
Bulldogs’ 43-25 win over La Grande on Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2022, in the
Baker gym.
Baker girls basketball coach
Jason Ramos was only able to
interrupt La Grande’s momen-
tum early in the game Tuesday,
Feb. 8, in the Baker gym.
Then his players went out
and seized that momentum.
The Bulldogs spotted La
Grande a 7-0 lead, but after
a key run late in the first half
Baker dominated en route to
a 43-25 win that clinched the
Greater Oregon League regu-
lar season title.
Baker, ranked third in the
Class 4A standings, improved
to 16-5 overall and remained
perfect, at 5-0, in the GOL with
one league game remaining.
La Grande, in second place,
dropped to 3-2, and 10-8
overall.
Ramos called the timeout
with 4:14 left in the first quar-
ter after La Grande’s Addy
Dunlap scored inside to give
the Tigers a 7-0 lead.
Baker, which won the first
game between the rivals, 51-
43 on Jan. 28, at La Grande,
struggled from the opening
tip Tuesday.
The Bulldogs had multiple
turnovers, including a five-sec-
ond call when they couldn’t in-
bound the ball.
Ramos said he told his play-
ers during the timeout to “just
settle down” and “take care of
the basketball.”
The brief break served its
purpose.
Baker got its first points just
16 seconds after the timeout
when Macey Moore whipped a
pass to Brooklyn Jaca for an in-
side basket.
Moore, who had five points
and two assists in the first
quarter, followed that with a
3-pointer to cut La Grande’s
lead to 7-5 with 2:07 left in the
first quarter.
After La Grande’s Kayle
Collman made a free throw
to give the Tigers a 10-9 lead,
Baker senior Katie Wilde
swished a 3-pointer from the
corner at the buzzer to give the
Bulldogs their first lead, 12-10.
Baker never trailed again.
Which is not to say the Bull-
dogs took control immediately.
The second quarter was
sometimes sloppy, with neither
team able to establish a rhythm
on offense. Both teams missed
the front end of consecutive
one-and-one free throw op-
portunities. There were multi-
ple turnovers.
The key stretch was the final
38 seconds of the half.
After La Grande’s Grace
Neer made a 16-footer to cut
Baker’s lead to 18-16, the Bull-
dogs scored six points in the
last 38 seconds. Jozie Ramos
had two of the baskets. She
also rebounded her owned
missed free throw and passed
to Moore for an inside basket.
“That was a great spurt at
the end of the first half to get
(the lead) to eight,” Jason Ra-
mos said.
WINTER OLYMPICS
After a fall, Shaun White stomps
his way into Winter Olympic final
so slightly and wound up
off-balance for the landing of
ZHANGJIAKOU, China — “The Tomahawk” — a trick
Shaun White let up just the ti- he invented more than a de-
niest bit as he jerked his body
cade ago that involves a fron-
around for a trick — his sig-
tside takeoff and then 1260
nature trick, and a trick he’s
degrees of spin at a diagonal,
landed without a hitch hun-
off-axis angle.
dreds of times before.
He most famously stuck
The next thing he knew, he
that trick to cap off the Van-
said, “I’m ... thinking, ‘Wow, I
couver Olympics in 2010, in
only have one more chance to
a “victory run” after his gold
get this done.’”
medal had already been sealed
After an untimely fall in the and he was simply showing
first round of qualifying, the
off for the crowd.
most-successful halfpipe rider
At 35 and with one more
in history turned the drama up contest left in his storied ca-
to “11” on Wednesday, Feb. 9,
reer, White doesn’t have that
coming through huge in a land- luxury anymore. Still, he wasn’t
or-go-home run that put him
alone in assuming he’d be in a
into the medal round at his fifth fight to the finish come Friday,
and final Olympics.
where two-time silver medal-
“It was not,” White said, “a
ist Ayumu Hirano and 2018
position I like to be in a lot.”
bronze medalist Scotty James
White found himself
are among those who will be
there when he eased up ever waiting to take his title.
BY EDDIE PELLS
AP National Writer
But after the fall in the first
of two qualifying rounds,
nothing felt certain. In the
preliminaries, riders get two
chances and their best score
counts. The top 12 riders ad-
vance. After Round 1, White
was in 19th place.
“I was thinking a lot about
that, like, how if the next run
went terribly, I’d be stand-
ing here, talking to everyone
over and over about how I’m
still happy to be here, but it
sucks,” White said. “I’m so
thankful I’m not living that
right now.”
Though White is no
stranger to pressure — he
won his third gold medal four
years ago with a near-perfect
trip on the day’s last run —
there’s something different
about riding for gold, as op-
posed to riding simply to get
to the gold-medal round.
BAKER (43)
Elms 1 0-1 2, Flanagan 1 0-0
2, Wilde 1 0-0 3, Gyllenberg 0
0-1 0, Pierce 2 3-4 7, Ramos 5
4-5 14, Roy 0 0-0 0, Jaca 1 0-0
2, Moore 4 3-4 13. Totals 15
10-15 43.
La Grande 10 6 4 5 — 25
Baker
12 12 10 9 — 43
Lisa Britton/Baker City Herald
Baker’s Jozie Ramos led all scorers with 14 points in the Bulldogs’ 43-
25 win over La Grande on Tuesday, Feb. 8, 2022, in the Baker gym.
Baker extended the lead
to 34-20 after three quarters,
and the Bulldogs cruised
from there.
Although Baker’s offense
sputtered at times, Jason Ra-
mos said he was pleased
throughout the game with the
Bulldogs’ defense.
That was a point of empha-
sis during recent practices,
he said.
During Baker’s 51-43 win
at La Grande, the Bulldogs
were never able to pull away
from the Tigers, due largely
to defensive lapses that led to
easy baskets.
Such miscues were rare
during Tuesday’s game, as
Baker held La Grande to 18
fewer points.
The Bulldogs had at least
eight blocked shots, includ-
ing six in the first half, two by
Rylee Elms.
“It was a great defensive ef-
fort,” Ramos said.
Makenzie Flanagan, who
had one of Baker’s blocked
shots, said that after the
first-quarter timeout following
La Grande’s 7-0 start, the Bull-
dogs settled down and started
“playing like we want to.”
As for Baker’s ability to
swat away so many La Grande
shots, Flanagan said that al-
though she sometimes looks
for chances to block a shot, in
most cases “it just happens” as
part of playing defense.
Fittingly, Elms capped the
barrage of blocks by knock-
ing away a shot with 15 sec-
onds left.
Jozie Ramos had a game-
high 14 points, and Moore
added 13. Sydnee Pierce had
seven points.
Makenna Shorts scored 13 of
La Grande’s 25 points. No other
Tiger had more than four.
Baker can wrap up an un-
beaten league schedule Friday,
Feb. 11, when the Bulldogs
travel to Ontario to play the
winless Tigers at 4 p.m. PST.
Win or lose, Baker will host
the GOL playoff game on Feb.
19 at 6:30 p.m. La Grande is
the most likely opponent. The
Tigers can clinch the berth
by beating Mac-Hi on Friday,
Feb. 11.
It’s
never
too late
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(541) 523-3679
210 Bridge St., Baker City, OR 97814