A10 • HERMISTONHERALD.COM
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 10, 2018
Herald Sports
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Hermiston gave
up 26 points in
fourth quarter
to continue skid
Dawgs end road trip with third
loss, return to home Friday
HERMISTON HERALD
STAFF PHOTOS BY E.J. HARRIS
Umatilla’s Trent Durfey fights for the ball with Stanfield’s Eduardo Nunez and Mario Sanchez (20) in the Vikings’ 80-22 win against the
Tigers on Thursday in Umatilla.
Umatilla will get some much-needed
rest before hosting Irrigon on Jan. 12 to
open Eastern Oregon League play.
By ALEXIS MANSANAREZ
STAFF WRITER
U
MATILLA — The Umatilla boys
basketball team had spent almost
its entire winter break on the
road.
From facing the Nixyaawii
Eagles on their home court to playing
in the Salem Academy Christian Holi-
day Tournament, it was the team’s lon-
gest away stretch of the season. And as
of Tuesday, the joyful return was put
on hold after Umatilla dropped its third
game of the season.
The Vikings, however, quickly recov-
ered and in front of a home crowd dished
the visiting Stanfield Tigers an 80-22
beating on Thursday.
“I’m glad we were able to end our
long, multiple games, tournaments, New
Year’s, Christmas vacation right now,”
head coach Scott Bow said after the
game. “Sickness has hit our team, we’ve
had multiple kids not playing or dehy-
drated all game because of it, so I’m glad
we ended where we did today.”
The fatigue of travel and illness that
comes with the new season didn’t show
on the court.
Umatilla was able to get out to an
early 18-4 lead after the first quarter, and
stay in control for the rest of the game.
The Vikings (12-3) had standout per-
formances from a number of player
and had 12 of their 13-player roster put
points on the board.
Junior Uriel Garcia led the team
with a game-high 18 points followed by
senior Kaden Webb, who dished out 16
points of his own, and junior Sebastian
Garcia, who knocked down 12.
One of Bow’s goals for the team was
to step up its defensive output. During
Umatilla’s road trip the most points it
had given up was 61 points — the sec-
ond most points scored on the Vikings
this season.
“We’ve held teams, even our losses,
way below their averages and that was
our goal tonight to hold them below their
average,” he said. “We met our goal.”
Girls basketball
Stanfield’s Kendra Hart draws contact
from Umatilla’s Charlene Alvarez in the
Tigers’ 33-32 win against the Vikings on
Thursday in Umatilla.
The Tigers (6-8) were averaging 48.7
points per game coming into Thursday’s
game, and finished well below barely
reaching the 20-point mark.
“Defense has kind of been our MO,”
Bow said. “Our kids have bought into
the defense very, very well and that’s the
one thing every night we’ve relied on.”
Umatilla’s defense completely shut
down Stanfield. The Tigers were kept
in the single digits every quarter, and no
player was able to score more than eight
points — junior Fernando Ramirez led
the team with eight points.
And with good defense comes good
offense. Uriel Garcia had a team-high of
four 3-pointers, while Webb and Sebas-
tian Garcia each had two apiece.
Coming off of the back-to-back losses
with a nearly 40-point victory is a good
momentum booster, but Bow and his
squad know none of that matters when
league play starts next week.
“Records out the window at this point
for us,” he said. “0-0 everyone is fresh.”
Entering Thursday’s doubleheader
against Umatilla, Stanfield girls basket-
ball head coach, Daniel Sharp, told his
team at the half that if they committed
over 30 turnovers they would lose the
game.
He turned out to be wrong, because
the tough Tiger squad outlasted the
Vikings to win only their second game
of the year.
The 33-32 victory came down to
the wire, and despite the 34 total turn-
overs committed by Stanfield, the Tigers
(2-11) were able to hold on for the win.
“I thought we played harder than
we have been,” Sharp said. “We played
Umatilla earlier in the year so it’s always
fun to get a second game and see if we
can get better, and that was the goal: to
get better.”
In the two teams’ first meeting back
on Dec. 9, it was the Vikings who came
away with the narrow victory. The 49-41
loss was Stanfield’s seventh in a row at
that point in the season, but Sharp saw
some improvement on the court and
notable performances from a few Tigers.
“Kendra (Hart) played tough,” Sharp
said. “She had four fouls in the whole
fourth quarter but said, ‘I’ll go play,’
and she did — and she didn’t foul, she
played smart. She’s a super athlete.
“I thought that Amanda (Carrillo)
finally started to attack,” he added. “We
lacked that ability to attack the basket
and she did that tonight. I thought (Alli-
son Griffin) played good defense. When
they do their role, it works out better.”
The first quarter of what ended
as a nail bitter was forgettable. Both
teams committed more turnovers than
attempted shots, and the score was a
meager 5-4 in favor of Stanfield.
Play picked up before the break with
the Tigers still holding on to their lead —
this time up 19-14.
YAKIMA — After a forgetta-
ble weekend at the Crescent Val-
ley Invitational — where Hermis-
ton went 0-2 — the Bulldog boys
opened 2018 on the road once
again.
On Wednesday, Jan. 3, the Bull-
dogs made a trip across the border
to face AC Davis in Yakima and
suffered a 74-60 loss at the hands
of the Pirates.
“(I) saw better things tonight,”
head coach Casey Arstein said,
“but you’re not going to win games
by giving up 26 points in the fourth
quarter.”
Despite the loss, Hermiston did
some things well. The Bulldogs
(4-7) held Davis’ “studs” to only
32 combined points.
The Pirates (8-2) were led by
sophomore Earl Lee III (18 points)
and senior Alexander Delgado (14
points) on their way to their third
consecutive victory.
Down only six points at the
half and trailing 31-25, Hermiston
came out of the break scoring 16 of
its 60 points. The early second-half
efforts were thanks to a sev-
en-point third-quarter performance
from junior Ryne Andreason.
Andreason finished with 12
points on the night behind junior
Cesar Ortiz, who had a team-high
16 points.
The Bulldogs entered the fourth
quarter only down 48-41 but some
mental mistakes led to a handful
of turnovers that Davis was easily
able to take advantage of. Herm-
iston’s first home game in nearly
three weeks — a matchup against
Silverton that was scheduled for
Friday — was canceled, but the
Bulldogs will take the Dawg House
floor Friday at 7 p.m. against Sun-
set, a 6A school from Portland.
Hermiston head
coach resigns
after six seasons
HERMISTON HERALD
After six years at the helm of
the Hermiston girls soccer team,
head coach Danielle MacBride has
resigned.
“It was a tough decision,” she
said, “but I’m getting to the point
in furthering my education that
I just can’t dedicate the time it
requires.”
MacBride also said she may be
required to move within the next
year.
She joined the program after
one of its most successful seasons
— an 11-3-0 record to close out
2011 — and leaves with a 24-35-
10 overall record.
This past season, the Bulldogs
finished second in the Class 5A
Columbia River Conference and
was ranked No. 20 in the state.
Hermiston will prepare to move
into the WIAA next year.
Per Hermiston athletic director
Larry Usher, there is no immediate
timeline to begin the hiring process
for finding a new head coach.
SCOREBOARD
Usher named Admin
of Year for Hermiston
Local slate
PREP BOYS BASKETBALL
Wednesday
Riverside at Irrigon, 7:30
Friday
Stanfield at Heppner, 6 p.m.
Sunset at Hermiston, 7 p.m.
Irrigon at Umatilla, 7:30 p.m.
Saturday
Culver at Stanfield, 2:30 p.m.
Umatilla at Burns, 5 p.m.
Hermiston at La Grande, 7:30 p.m.
HERMISTON HERALD
PREP GIRLS BASKETBALL
Wednesday
Riverside at Irrigon, 6:30 p.m.
Hermiston at Post Falls (ID), 7 p.m.
Friday
Irrigon at Umatilla, 6 p.m.
Stanfield at Heppner, 7:30 p.m.
Saturday
Culver at Stanfield, 4 p.m.
Hermiston at La Grande, 5:45 p.m.
Umatilla at Burns, 6:30 p.m.
PREP WRESTLING
Friday
Hermiston, Pendleton, Mac-Hi, Riverside,
Irrigon, Heppner at Oregon Classic (Redmond)
Saturday
Hermiston, Pendleton, Mac-Hi, Riverside,
Irrigon, Heppner at Oregon Classic (Redmond)
Echo at Bonanza Invite
PREP SWIMMING
Saturday
Pendleton, Hermiston at Baker, Noon
PHOTO COURTESY OF HERMISTON SCHOOL DISTRICT
Hermiston athletic director Larry Usher speaks to the students at
an assembly on Wednesday after being selected as the district’s
Administrator of the Year for 2017-18.
The Hermiston School Dis-
trict announced on Wednesday that
athletic director Larry Usher was
selected as its 2017-18 Administra-
tor of the Year, a district-wide honor.
In Usher’s second school year as
the AD, he most notably led Herm-
iston’s efforts to secure membership
in the Washington Interscholastic
Activities Association to better suit
the student-athletes in amount of
travel time and time missed from
the classroom. In a press release, the
district also cited other accomplish-
ments by Usher, including helping
increase student attendance at ath-
letic events, starting a student pre-
game tailgate party at select ath-
letic events, improving the schools’
‘Boomer’ mascot, and increasing
the use of social media to promote
events and emphasize the school’s
brand.
Usher has been with the dis-
trict since 2002 when he was first
hired as a high school social stud-
ies teacher and coached the varsity
boys basketball team from 2002-
2010. Then from 2010-2014, Usher
moved to Sandstone Middle School
where he held titles of dean of stu-
dents, assistant principal and prin-
cipal before being hired as AD in
2016.