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About Hermiston herald. (Hermiston, Or.) 1994-current | View Entire Issue (June 3, 2015)
SPORTS JUNE 3, 2015 HERMISTONHERALD.COM A6 WEDNESDAY, YOUTH LACROSSE • SIGNING • SCHEDULE Take me out to the ballgame, any game Broken and rebuilt on the field of play Andre Allison carves out new identity after old one broke his back SAM BARBEE FROM THE SIDELINES Sports reporter BY SAM BARBEE HERMISTON HERALD Hermiston’s Andre Al- lison didn’t know who he was. He was 13 years old in 2012, nursing a broken back and enduring his first full year without sports. He was depressed, his former self a distant memory. But the thing that aban- doned him — sports — also rescued him. S ometimes, you just need to get out of the house. That was how East Oregonian sports reporter Erik Skopil and I felt this past weekend. So we decided to go to Walla Walla and check it out. Walla Walla is a cool little town with a population of around 30,000. It’s home to former NFL quarterback Drew Bledsoe, as well as top-notch wineries and the Walla Walla Sweets, a collegiate summer baseball team playing in the West Coast League. For two summers when I was in college, I interned for a WCL team in Longview called the Cowlitz Black Bears and knew the baseball and times were good. So, seeing a light pole banner in downtown Walla Walla, I convinced Erik we should attend this game. I checked the online schedule and, sure enough, the Sweets were playing the Wenatchee Apple Sox. We didn’t know what we were going to do that day. Now we knew. 1RZWKLVZRXOGEHWKH¿UVWEDVHEDOOJDPH I’ve attended all year that I wasn’t covering. That’s not really a complaint, since I enjoy watching America’s pastime, but it’s a different experience. I don’t have to bother with following counts and seeing who made what play and to whom they threw the ball. It makes rundowns fun to watch and not torturous to follow. :H¿JXUHGRXWZKHUHWKHVWDGLXPZDVDQGLW included a 20-minute walk, not bad considering how hot it was and how out of shape I am. It took us just about an hour because we missed our turn. I was in charge of navigation, so it was my fault. I’ll take the heat. Eventually, we made it close enough to the stadium that we could hear the public address announcer, and got closer still that we could follow the crowd. There was a good turnout for the season-opener for the Sweets and a line had formed at the ticket booth. We joined with our $7 ready for general admission tickets, but shortly thereafter a woman approached us and offered us two for free. We accepted and went in, thinking we had just lucked out in a big way. We found some seats — rather high because we both like to see stuff develop, we are reporters after all — and looked forward to the beginning of the game. But there were some interesting aspects that ZHQRWLFHGEXWFRXOGQ¶WTXLWH¿JXUHRXW 7KH¿UVWWKLQJ,QRWLFHGZDVWKHXQLIRUPV2QH WHDPZDVZHDULQJUHGFDPRXÀDJHG7VKLUWVZLWK grey pants, and the other team was wearing blue camo shirts with grey pants. My experience in the WCL told me that no two teams have uniforms close to being similar, so I was confused. The second strange thing was the PA announcer recognizing the umpires for “donating their time.” At that point, we didn’t know what was happening. It turns out we had stumbled across not the Sweets’ season-opener, but Walla Walla Law Enforcement versus Walla Walla Fire and First Responders. I suddenly realized I had been looking at June’s schedule before, not May’s. It was a community fundraiser game. It’s an annual thing, as Erik overheard a conversation about the police winning last year. I can say with absolute certainty we were the only ones in the ballpark who didn’t know what was happening. It was pretty serious, too. Players were obviously competitive, and fans would voice their pleasure or displeasure based on what they saw. So we watched the game with smiles. Erik did some heckling in jest and soaked in the baseball. The quality of the ball was better than either of us expected, but Erik turned to me in about the fourth inning and said, “You know, if I had paid seven bucks for this, I wouldn’t have been very happy.” It was a joke, but I felt the same way. That isn’t to detract from what we walked into, but we really wanted to watch some high-level collegiate players do their thing. The game worked its way along, and the police took a 5-3 lead behind some good pitching, but Erik and I left after the seventh to watch the Mariners lose at a bar we both like. It was a pretty funny day, that we decided to go to Walla Walla Friday night, thought it was a Sweets game, only to be “disappointed” it wasn’t. We had a brief conversation with a woman afterwards about our expectations and she laughed. Not at us, but at our misinterpretation of what we saw. Although we didn’t get to do exactly what we wanted, we got out of the house and had a good time. Sometimes, that’s all that matters. — Sam Barbee is the Hermiston Herald sports reporter. He can be reached at sbarbee@hermis- tonherald.com THE FALL SAM BARBEE PHOTO +HUPLVWRQ+LJK6FKRROMXQLRU$QGUH$OOLVRQKROGVXSDÀUVWSODFH trophy from the Spokane Youth Lacrosse LAXFest May 16-17. Allison turned to coaching after his athletic career was ended with a severe back injury. SAM BARBEE PHOTO Before he was coaching youth lacrosse, Herm- iston’s Andre Allison was a good player in his own right. But he suffered a severe back injury in eighth grade, and, after a long healing process, turned to coaching ‘as therapy.’ Allison was a good ath- lete. By his eighth-grade lacrosse season, he had earned the nickname “The Beast” because of his size and athletic ability. Oppos- ing teams looked down the sidelines and saw the bulky Allison ready to dominate the game, and they would shutter. He was a standout in football, too, holding his own at the line of scrim- mage. But all this athletic suc- cess hampered Allison, and he’s the first one to admit it. It hampered him socially, however, not physically. “I was kind of cocky and mean in high school when I was playing sports,” he said. “You know, ‘Sports is life, I’m the best.’ I thought I was it. I thought I was go- ing to get scholarships, go to college, play football and lacrosse.” That eighth-grade season proved to be Allison’s last. He fractured the L5 ver- tebra in his spine when an opponent checked his back, cracking the vertebra slight- ly. Right away, the pain sensors in his body fired down into his hips and legs. He thought that was where the problem was, not the cracked vertebra. Doctors were concerned about ap- pendicitis or other internal problems, but the back and spine were left unchecked. So Allison continued to play. A few months later, fall camp began for foot- ball, and Allison was set to enter the high school pro- gram as a freshman. Early in camp, it became obvious his back was in trouble. He hurt it again. His mother, DiAna, took him to the hospital. “He couldn’t walk,” she said. “It was scary.” Allison was diagnosed with a double fracture in the L5, and both were bro- ken all the way through. The doctor gave Allison the worst news possible. When he walked in, Allison asked, “How long will I be out, doc?” with full optimism and enthusiasm that it might be a few weeks or a month or two at most. The word that followed broke Alli- son’s heart: “Forever.” “Right away, it was just in slow motion,” Allison said. “It was like, ‘This isn’t happening right now.’ I was such a young kid. I’m still SEE ALLISON/A7 Youth lacrosse popularity growing &RI¿Q ‘New’ spring sport OHDYLQJ gains participants, 6WDQ¿HOG followers Now, they are now top placers at tournaments, high- lighted by the third- and fourth-grade team winning a large tournament in Spokane where they were the only team from Oregon in atten- dance. BY SAM BARBEE Why has lacrosse become HERMISTON HERALD so popular? What is it threat- In recent years, the Herm- ening baseball and softball iston Youth Lacrosse program as the chief traditional spring has been growing at an expo- sports? nential rate. Just two short Some of it has to do with years ago, Hermiston teams the game itself. Base sports routinely had fewer than 11 are notorious for their slow players, the number needed nature, while lacrosse is fast- WR¿HOGD IXOOWHDPWKH\DQG paced. For Hermiston resident had to borrow players from Brooke Palzinski, lacrosse’s other teams. speed is what attracted her “high-energy” daughters. When one played softball, she would cheer and congrat- ulate opposing batters when they reached base “because she had someone to talk to.” “Lacrosse is constant ac- tion, constant running, and it has a much more team feel, lacrosse does,” Palzinski said. “I think baseball still (is) if I strike out, if I just got the hit, if I make the catch. Lacrosse is much more team-oriented, and you’re much more in- vested in the people you’re playing with.” Echo resident BeAnne SEE LACROSSE/A7 After one year as Stand- ¿HOG¶V KHDG IRRWEDOO FRDFK and athletic director, Dom- LQLTXH &RI¿Q LV KHDGLQJ back to Washington. Travis Reeser, formerly of Sun- ridge Middle School in Pendleton, has been hired as the new physical edu- cation/health teacher and DWKOHWLFGLUHFWRU¿OOLQJWZR RI &RI¿Q¶V YDFDWHG SRVL- tions, the school district an- nounced. Ledbetter becomes a Penguin Hermiston pitcher signs with coach she met as a 14-year-old BY SAM BARBEE HERMISTON HERALD When Madisen Ledbetter was 14 years old, she met a coach that she really wanted to play for. It was Mandy Hill, and she was then a student teacher at a clinic Ledbet- ter attended. She knew then that Hill was a coach that she wanted to learn from. Four years later, that wish was granted. Hill took a job at Clark College in Vancouver, Washington, and that’s where Ledbetter is headed, too. She signed her letter of intent Monday to join the Penguins softball program under Hill. “Mandy wanted me to SEE LEDBETTER/A7 SAM BARBEE PHOTO Surrounded by her family, Hermiston senior Madisen Ledbetter holds up her letter of intent to play softball at Vancouver, Washington’s Clark College next spring. GO SEE IT Wednesday, June 3 Baseball Hermiston Little League games starting at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, June 4 Baseball Hermiston Little League games starting at 5 p.m. Friday, June 5 Golf Big River GC closed for Meadowood Springs Fundrais- er Tournament Baseball Hermiston Little League games starting at 5 p.m. Saturday, June 6 Golf Big River GC closed for Meadowood Springs Fundrais- er Tournament Sunday, June 7 Golf Big River GC closed for Meadowood Springs Fundrais- er Tournament If you have any other local sports events, contact Sam Barbee at sbarbee@hermistonherald.com