By Jeremy McDonald
Jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com
SALEM, Ore.– It took a half, but when Western Christian came around, their Tri-River Conference game wirh Regis lived up to the hype.
The Pioneers trailed the Rams by 13 points early in the second half. But whether it was the magic of playing in The Barn and the student section behind them or it being a rivalry game, perhaps both were involved, but Western Christian began to claw back.
It was similar to when they trailed Harrisburg and Oakland in recent games, trailing early only to come back.
After three, Regis’ lead was down to eight with the Rams leading 34-26. But Western wasn’t done yet as they cut it to one with 1:13 left in the game.
The Pioneers trailed Regis 42-41 at this point.
“The way the girls came back, it could’ve gotten 20, 25 points if we didn’t just fight. The girls just fought, ” said Western Christian’s Ben Brown. “When you’re playing in The Barn and you’re playing someone like Regis, your rival, there’s nothing better than that.
“We may play them twice, we may play them three times, we may play them four times. Get used to each other, it’s going to be a heavyweight fight every time.”
For the Rams, through their nine games, none had been this close. So they had to lock up to find a way to hold off a surging Western Christian squad over the final 73 seconds of the game.
Their defense locked up. They got the stops. They converted on their free throws to get the cushion to get their lead to hold off the Pios 45-41 on Friday night
“It really shows that we can tighten up on those tight game. We knew we could rely on our drives to score and I knew that our defense could prove strong,” said Regis’ Hadley Foster. “We need to go in more and not live by the three.”
Foster and Frankie Koehnke led the Rams with 12 points, Regis will head to Bend on Saturday to play Trinity Lutheran.
Photos By Jeremy McDonald
