By James Day
The Silverton High basketball teams won pair of back-to-back high-pressure games against Corvallis and changed the complexion of both Mid-Willamette Conference races.
For the girls, Tuesday’s 40-31 win at Corvallis gave the top-ranked Foxes some breathing room. Silverton rallied from an early 7-0 deficit, and used a 20-3 run to take tenuous control of a game that wasn’t settled until Brooke McCarty and Maggie Roth nailed two free throws apiece in the final minutes. Silverton is 20-0 overall and improved to 10-0 in the Mid-Willamette Conference, two games ahead of No. 5 Corvallis with four games to play.
“It wasn’t the start we wanted,” said Foxes girls coach Tal Wold, “but we kept grinding it out. And our bigs played so stinking hard. We want to be a great team, we just have to stick with it.”
The boys, meanwhile, hosted the Spartans and desperately needed a win Wednesday to stay in the league race. Corvallis came in at 8-1, with the Foxes one game back at 7-2.
Desperation won out as the scrappy Foxes, the defending Class 5A state champions, used a torrid fourth-quarter start to take a six-point lead and held on from there for a 57-54 nailbiter that left the two teams tied at 8-2 with four games left.
Corvallis led 44-42 at the end of three quarters, but Julian Downey drilled a three, Sam Roth drove for a layup and Downey buried another 3-pointer for a 50-44 lead. The Spartans battled back to tied it at 50-50, but Blake Cosgrove made a three-point play and added a fast-break layup to keep the Spartans at bay.
“We came out looking for revenge,” said Cosgrove, whose team lost at 54-48 at Corvallis on Jan. 15. “We weren’t coming out of this game with a loss. We finished better and I thought we played better overall.”
Downey finished with 22 points and made six 3-pointers for the Foxes. Roth and Cosgrove finished with 13 apiece.
Meanwhile, Kennedy closed out its Tri-River championship league season with a 57-41 home win Feb. 9 vs. Regis. The Trojans took the title with an 11-1 record. Defending 2A champion Western Mennonite (8-3) and perennial power Regis (7-4) find themselves looking up at Kennedy in the league standings this year.
Swimming: The Foxes headed into this weekend’s district competition in Corvallis after concluding one of the best dual meet seasons in school history. The boys were 5-1 overall in the Mid-Willamette Conference and 10-1 overall, while the girls were 4-2 in league and 9-2 overall.
The boys lost only to Lebanon, while Corvallis and Crescent Valley defeated the girls squad.
Included was a season-ending win against South Albany in which the Foxes swept while winning just two events in each meet.
“We really do not have anyone that you would consider a star swimmer,” said first-year coach Lucky Rogers, who has served as an assistant the past nine seasons.
“Every team we go against has multiple swimmers that you can’t wait to watch because they are that good. We do not have those swimmers. So, we should not be winning our dual meets like we have been. Except for one fact: We have depth.
“I have good swimmers in all events. Usually two or three of them. It is because of this that we are winning our dual meets. We may not win each individual event, but we are getting 2nd-3rd-4th or 2nd-3rd-5th. There will not be any school records broken this year. We have a few chances to go to state, but it will require some awesome swims at districts.”
Rogers, who has taught and coached at Silverton for the past 26 years, praised the senior leadership of Lindsey Orr, Tyler Cohade and Cole Hackett and noted that he thinks both squads will finish in the top four at districts.
“All the teams in our league have club swimmers,” Rogers said. “We do not have any of those kids. Making it to state is our goal always. However, we do not make it there very often. You never know though. We are very competitive ,and the kids are really learning/wanting to compete. I am very proud of what we have accomplished this year.”
Wrestling: Austin Reed won a pair of tournament titles for the Foxes, who will be hosting the Mid-Willamette distrct meet Feb. 19-20. Reed pinned Josiah Bales of Bend at the Jan. 30 Hood River Elks Invitational and blanked Sammy Chung of Dallas 14-0 at the Mid-Valley Classic. Jacob Whitehead (106), Tabor Tarpley (145) and Braden Sinn (160) also won titles at the Mid-Valley Classic, while Sinn also took third in Hood River.
The Foxes are 1-2 in league duals in recent weeks, downing Corvallis 54-24 while falling to Central 42-39 and Dallas 61-13.
Track and field: Silverton senior Maddie Fuhrman claimed a pair of personal bests at an invitational meet Feb. 6 at the Dempsey Indoor Center at the University of Washington. Fuhrman took second in her mile heat in 5:09, a lifetime best, while taking fourth in her 800 heat in 2:21. The 800 time is an indoor PR. Fuhrman and the rest of the state’s track and field athletes begin outdoor training Feb. 29.
Race results: Stephen Schaefer and Ben Handrich were the big winners Feb. 6 at the 5K run-walk and 10K run at Wurstfest in Mount Angel. Schaefer, 34, from Portland, won the 5K in 18:56.2. Handrich, 29, of Salem, was the 10K champion in 36:52.3.
Rachel Peters, 29, of Canby, finished second overall and was the top woman 5K finisher in 20:42.8. Maya Velez, 27, of Salem, was fourth overall in the 10K in 42:24.6, and led all women runners. Slightly more than 400 people participated in the two events.
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