THE DALLES — The Dalles High School boys basketball program picked up two home Class 4A wins, beating Gladstone, 70-58, on Feb. 20 and Baker, 79-49, on Feb. 21.
The Riverhawks (12-11, 3-3 Tri-Valley Conference) used a 1-3-1 zone defense to separate from Gladstone (6-18, 1-6 TVC) in the third quarter and win their third straight game.
“In the first half, we were giving too much space to the high post, and they were getting good offense out of that,” Coach Brian Stevens said. “In the third quarter, our adjustment was simply to overload. So, when an offense overloads against a zone, we’re going to overload that same side and make him throw the big pass, and that ended it. They had a couple throwaway turnovers, and it frazzled them, and then we came down and got buckets every and every guy scored.”
The Riverhawks led 32-21 at halftime and 57-40 at the end of the third quarter. Calder Morrison led the Riverhawks in scoring with 18 points, adding five rebounds, three assists and three steals. Oliver Stevens added 17 points, nine assists, three blocks and six deflections. Derek Goulart had 11 rebounds.
The next day, The Dalles battled the defending back-to-back 4A state champion Baker High School Bulldogs in a non-league game at Kurtz Gymnasium.
The Riverhawks and Bulldogs (12-11, 5-1 TVC) went back and forth to start, with The Dalles leading 19-17 at the end of the first quarter. The Dalles caught fire on the offensive end in the second quarter, going on a 24-6 run to lead 43-23 at halftime.
Stevens led the way in scoring with 24 points, and he added nine assists. Morrison added a double-double of 21 points and 10 rebounds.
Brian Stevens said, “All of our players actually cared today, simple as that. They read the scouting report. I could tell today that most of them did. The mistakes that we made were mistakes that were in the scouting report, but we only made those mistakes once each for three people, and they corrected and didn’t make it again.”
The Riverhawks have two remaining games on their schedule: senior night against Estacada on Feb. 24 at 6:30 p.m. in Kurtz Gymnasium and at Molalla on Feb. 27 at 7 p.m. “If we win both those games, we’re the second seed in our conference,” Stevens said. “And now we’re on our way to the playoffs. If we lose one of those two games, we will probably fall out of the playoffs. So, you talk about momentum, winning this game [vs. Baker] just keeps that momentum [going].”
Commented