By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
BEAVERTON, Ore.– Yamhill-Carlton’s Lilah Stahl had all the pressure in the world on her shoulders stepping to the line with 1.2 seconds left in the game.
They were tied with Jefferson at 40-all. The junior missed the first free throw before Tiger Head Coach Cliff Toney called timeout to settle not just the teams nerves, but her own as well.
He had all the confidence in the world that she would hit the remaining pair of what was a three-shot foul as she was taking a three-point shot moments earlier.
“Those are tough one’s to shoot ” starts Toney. “I just looked at her in the eyes and I said, ‘after you get done making those teo free throws, I need you go run at the ball so they have to throw over somebody. Just to give her that confidence that I believe that she’s going to make them.”
She hit the remaining two shots out of the timeout to hand Yamhill-Carlton a 42-40 lead. Their defense helped closed out what was a 12-point comeback in the second half against the Lions.
Jefferson led the Tigers 30-18 at halftime. Genevieve Orton scored 16 of her 20 points in the opening half as the week-plus off didn’t seem to bother the Lions much out of the gate on Sunday at Valley Catholic.
“We hit some shots, Gen got going really well in the first half and we had a lot of momentum, a lot of energy and then when shots weren’t continue to fall, we kind of lost that energy and couldn’t maintain that,” said Jefferson Head Coach Zach Maison.
By the end of the third quarter the Lions lead was down to four, 34-30 and by the final minute of the game, the game was tied at 40.
“Late game execution. We got to be able not to foul on the last possession and gift them three free throws. We got to get better shots down the stretch,” said Maison. “It’s huge to play some teams who really push the pace , get up and press and are physical. It’s going to be helpful for us preparing for the rest of the league schedule. “
Jefferson will play Valley Catholic Monday at 3:15pm. The Tigers will play Regis on Monday at 6:45pm in a rematch from December 13 at the Dayton Tournament.
“It’s an opportunity to see if we gotten a little bit better, and see if we can do better against their press and do a little bit better job rebounding,” starts Toney. “I thought those are the two big differences in the last game.
“I thought we did extremely well guarding (Frankie) Koehnke and Clara. We held them to 20, but the problem was that they still scored 60 because we didn’t rebound well and turned it over too much in the press.”
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
