Cowgirls take district title - Central Oregonian

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Lon Austin

The Crook County Cowgirls are district champions.

The Cowgirls overcame a slow start to defeat the Roosevelt Roughriders 59-40 on Friday night to guarantee themselves a play-in game.

“We didn’t have the energy we needed at the start of the game,” said head coach Dave Johnson. “We didn’t have a lot of the stuff that we usually bring, but we got things going in the second quarter.”

The Cowgirls, who defeated the Roughriders 62-35 in their previous meeting, struggled to find the basket in the opening frame. Crook County began to show some life late in the period, and took a 13-10 lead into the second quarter.

The Cowgirls cranked up the defensive pressure in the second period, outscoring the Roughriders 25-13 to take a commanding 38-23 lead into the locker room at the half.

“We talked about ‘Hey this is our most important game of the year,’” Johnson said. “If we don’t win our special district then it doesn’t matter what our ranking is, our state playoffs are in jeopardy. The second quarter we came out and played with more energy and shot the ball extremely well.”

The Cowgirls were red-hot from the field in the quarter, hitting four three-point shots as they took control of the game.

Crook County relied on their defensive pressure in the third quarter as they outscored Roosevelt 13-4 in the period to take a 51-27 lead into the fourth quarter.

From there, the Cowgirls coasted to the easy win.

Kayla Morgan and Jessie Loper each hit three long-range shots for the Cowgirls, while Brooke Buswell added two, three-pointers of her own in the contest.

Morgan finished the game with 12 points and six assists, while Loper added 11 points and five steals. Buswell finished with 10 points and nine assists. Makayla Lindburg finished with eight points, and led the Cowgirls in rebounding with eight.

Alexia Julian led the Roughriders with eight points, while Asia Greene finished with seven.

With the win, the Cowgirls broke a three-game losing streak. Crook County is now 12-8 on the season, while Roosevelt falls to 2-14 and out of playoff contention.

The Cowgirls, who are 20th in the latest OSAA Class 4A power rankings, took a giant step towards returning to the playoffs with the victory.

Not only did the win guarantee the Cowgirls an at-large play-in game, it was a giant step towards earning a home game. Although Crook County still has three games to go against tough 5A and 6A schools, they currently hold the No. 1 at-large berth. As a result, if the play-in games were tomorrow, they would host the No. 3 team from the Greater Oregon League. Baker currently holds that position with a 5-13 record.

“It’s nice to win the special district and be guaranteed a play-in game,” Johnson said. “That’s a big positive.”

Friday, February 3

at Roosevelt

Crook County (59) — Kayla Morgan 12, Loper 11, Buswell 10, Solomon 9, Lindburg 8, Ovens 3, Martin 2, Johnston 2, Walker 1, Smith 1, Apperson, Saenz. Totals 19 13-28 59.

Roosevelt (40) — Alexia Julian 8, Greene 7, Kingery 5, MacWilliamson 4, Gilbert 4, Norton 4, Johnson 4, Strandberg 3, N. Greene 1, Walters, Rhone, Verbout, Ananouko. Totals 15 9-21 40.

Crook County 13 25 13 8 — 59

Roosevelt 10 13 4 13 — 40

Three-point goals — Crook County: Morgan 3, Loper 3, Buswell 2; Roosevelt: Kingery.