BULLDOGS GUARD DALLTON DEWEY GETS A LAYUP PAST OAKERS GUARD JACOB BROOKSBY DURING THE SECOND QUARTER OF THE CRESWELL VS OAKLAND MATCHUP ON DEC. 14. THE CRESWELL BULLDOGS LOST TO THE OAKLAND OAKERS 47-55 AND HAVE A CURRENT OVERALL RECORD OF 6-3. Christopher Palanuk/The Creswell Chronicle
A buzzer-beater by Dallton Dewey boosted Creswell to a 69-67 boys’ basketball victory over host Salem Academy on Dec. 11.
The Bulldogs trailed 13-19 after the first quarter and 31-33 at halftime, but led 51-50 after three quarters and were up six with three minutes left to play before the Crusaders scored off three successive Bulldog turnovers to tie it, 67-67 with 40 seconds remaining.
Creswell was whistled for traveling, and after a Salem Academy timeout the Crusaders were called for traveling; Creswell Head Coach Jesse Thomas called a timeout with just seven seconds remaining.
Kai Apo inbounded the ball to Dewey near the opposing free-throw line, but the play Thomas had drawn up during the timeout proved unworkable.
”But Dallton’s a gamer – he improvised; he got it, put it on the ground and went,” Thomas said. ”He made a nice pump fake, the (defender) flew past him, he put up a shot and it went in to win it for us.”
But it was Tyler Frieze’s light’s-out shooting that kept Creswell in position to make Dewey’s victory shot possible. The junior guard scored a game-high 32 points on 6-of-8 field-goal, 5-of-6 three-point and 4-of-6 free-throw shooting. He also grabbed eight rebounds.
”Tyler played great – and he played the whole game; he didn’t come out for a second,” Thomas said.
Apo added 12 points, five rebounds and two assists; Dewey had 10 points, three assists and two steals; Tayler Forsman had seven points, five assists and two steals; and Austin Gabriel had four points and seven rebounds.
”Austin was really solid; he played some great post defense and got some big rebounds for us,” Thomas said.
The Dawgs fell 47-55 to visiting Oakland on Dec. 14.
Creswell trailed 10-11 after one but led 22-18 at halftime and 36-33 after three. But the 2A Oakers – undefeated at 6-0 – outscored the Dawgs 22-11 in the final period.
”We defended the best we’ve defended the first three quarters of any game we’ve had this year, but we struggled shooting the ball,” Thomas said, citing 10-of-26 field-goal and 5-of-23 three-point shooting. ”We also got into foul trouble early; Tyler (Frieze) had to sit most of the first half and then got another foul early in the third quarter, so he never got going and didn’t score at all.”
Apo stepped up for Creswell, though, scoring 17 points, including 4-of-5 free throws, and grabbing five rebounds and four steals. Forsman added 14 points, six rebounds, three assists and two steals; and Gabriel had four points and 10 rebounds.
”Oakland’s really good; they’re very physical, very tough, long, athletic – and they executed really well in the fourth quarter,” Thomas said. ”We hadn’t played a game that physical yet; there was a lot of contact and lots of fouls called on both teams.”
Creswell hosts Sutherlin and Westside Christian this week. ”Sutherlin will be a lot like Oakland, so hopefully we can take some of what we learned from Oakland and be ready to win both our games this week,” Thomas said.
The Dawgs are then idle until their league opener on Jan. 4.
”We’ve gotten off to a really good start,” Thomas said. ”We’ve played some really good teams, and we can have a lot of good practices before our first league game to come out ready to do some things people haven’t seen from us yet, and hopefully get off to a strong start in league.”
