Seth Thompson
The Chronicle
COTTAGE GROVE – The Pleasant Hill Billies girls basketball team traveled to Cottage Grove to face the Lions on Thursday to kick off the Battle of I-5 Tournament. Confidence was high.
In the end, the Class 4A Lions reigned supreme, beating the Class 3A Billies 54-39.
The Lions relied on its defense, holding the Billies to only 3 points in the first quarter, and 16 points in the first half.
A big part of the defensive success was center Makya Alsup.
“She’s the center of everything going on out there, and she does it well,” Lions coach Kim Beer said. She’s always calm and she’s the calm of our team. Everybody else is losing their mind and she’s able to stay with the game, and that’s important to us. I think that that helps everybody.
Beer credits the team’s hustle for the victory. Whether it was grabbing offensive rebounds, jumping in passing lanes, or contesting shooters, the Lions were everywhere on Thursday night.
“Hustle, and that really was it; we knew they had several, several girls that were 3-point shooters, and so we had talked about at least getting out there and getting a hand up and making them rush the shot,” Beer said. “I think that’s what happened in that first half, making them rush the shot. We fell back a little bit on that in the second half and let him have some shots, but I think that was the key to it.”
For the Billies and first year head coach Terry Newton, this marks their second loss of the season. This was the Billies fifth game in seven days, and with two more coming up in the following two days, Newton cited fatigue as a factor.
“It’s just a lot having so many games in two weeks. I told them that we’re going to ask a lot of y’all tonight, and they gave it their all, but we have no energy,” Newton said.
Since his time with the Billies, Newton has implemented a new defensive strategy with the full-court-press. Along with those growing pains, Billies’ point guard Josie Dudley has suffered from a knee injury.
“We’ve lost a couple key players. Josie being the point guard and the leader is a big one to lose, and we have to make adjustments without her,” Newton said.
After sustaining a knee injury in practice, Newton has since said Dudley is “done for the year”.
The Billies unfortunately sustained another loss in this tournament on Friday against Marist, losing 35-40. They secured a win on the final day, though, beating Newport 53-21 on Saturday.
The Lions on the other hand, took down Brookings Harbor on Friday, 38-36. This win brought them to Creswell to face the Bulldogs, where the Lions fell 26-62.
