By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
TURNER, Ore.– The Cascade Girls Basketball team gave the second-ranked Springfield Millers their best shot Tuesday night in Turner in a non-league game.
The Cougars led the Millers 17-14 after one quarter and had a six-point advantage over Springfield entering halftime, leading 31-25. They were playing as one cohesive unit and it was paying off as they went into the second half looking to sustain that momentum from the first half of the game.
“It was a really fun game. We all worked together well as a team, especially since we’ve been struggling with that. Tonight we all just went out there and had fun,” said Lainey Klampe. “I think it’s a good look at how we’re becoming a team. They’re second in State in 5A, I think we played well tonight just based on how we’ve been playing and I’m excited to see how we do on Friday.”
Springfield caught Cascade in a lull to start the second half as they used a 18-6 run to storm ahead in the third quarter. Turnovers, rebounding, just the little things allowed the Millers to pull ahead of the Cougars and swing momentum into their favor.
It was 43-37 Springfield entering the final minute of the third quarter, but slowly Cascade came back. By quarter’s end, they trailed 43-42. Springfield pulled back ahead 53-46 midway through the fourth quarter, only to see Cascade rally back once more. The Cougars couldn’t overcome the deficit to stun the Millers, falling to the 5A squad 57-52. But with a week-and-a-half worth of practices ahead of them before their non-league finale on January 16 against Tillamook, they got plenty of time to polish up the little things that plagued them in Tuesday’s game for that finale going into Oregon West Conference play the second half of the month.
“Just the fundamentals. Dribbling, making good passes, reading the defense correctly,” said Klampe, who led Cascade with 15 points.
Olivia Bennett contributed another 13 points and Rosalynn Schmunk contributed another nine points in the game.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
