Henley basketball polished off an undefeated weekend at the Marist Classic with a pair of wins over Cottage Grove Saturday. Here’s how both games unfolded.
Girls: Henley 61, Cottage Grove 44
Henley (6-0) raced out to a 36-13 halftime lead as Cottage Grove (3-1) struggled with turnovers on offense and had no answer for Annie Campos–who outscored the Lions by herself in the first half with 14 points–on defense.
Cottage Grove briefly made things interesting in the fourth quarter; after Senia Campos hit a free throw to put the Hornets up 51-30 with 5:53 to go, the Lions exploded for 11 points in the next 1:35 to cut the lead to 10. Henley quickly regained control after a timeout and didn’t allow a field goal for the rest of the game.
Annie Campos finished with 19 points, 4 rebounds, 4 steals and 3 assists, and Anna Harper had another outstanding game on the boards with 11 points, 14 rebounds and 2 assists. Other contributors for the Hornets were Kennedi Modin with 8 points; Senia Campos with 7 points, 4 rebounds, 3 assists and 3 steals; Lily Fussell with 6 points, 2 rebounds, 2 steals and 1 block; Jewell Northcutt with 4 points, 5 steals and 3 rebounds; Prestyn Schade with 4 points and 3 steals; and Mya Mauch with 2 points and 2 steals.
Mariah Bailey led Cottage Grove with 13 points (including 9 in the third quarter), followed by Makya Alsup with 11, Jaylee Lima and Payton Anlauf with 8 each, and Sienna Wagner and Summer Lebow with 2 each.
The Henley girls return to Yreka (CA) (5-3) for a rematch of the Yreka Invitational championship game at 7 p.m. Tuesday.
Boys: Henley 48, Cottage Grove 43
Henley (5-1) pulled out a tight win for the second day in a row, with Saturday’s game against Cottage Grove (2-2) unfolding in very similar fashion to Friday’s game against Marist Catholic (even the final scores of both matchups were almost the same).
Powered by 8 points each from Markus McCreadie and Luke Bennett, the Hornets led 16-8 after the first quarter. They stretched the lead to 27-14 late in the second, but the Lions’ Landon Vaughn hit two unanswered threes in the final 1:50–including one at the buzzer–to cut it to 27-20 at halftime.
Just as Lane Frank’s buzzer-beating layup to end the third quarter against Marist Catholic Friday sparked a big run for Henley to open the fourth, Vaughn’s first half buzzer-beater sparked a big run for Cottage Grove to open the second. The Lions went on an 8-0 run in the first 2:05 of the third quarter and held the Hornets scoreless until McCreadie tied the game at 29-29 with 4:15 remaining. Henley settled back in from there, taking a 38-33 lead heading into the fourth.
“We just had to take care of the basketball a little bit better and take some better shots,” Henley head coach Luke Hammond said. “We got rushed on offense and didn’t have our same urgency defensively [at the beginning of the third quarter].”
Cole Kishen hit a contested floater with 6:33 remaining to make it a one-possession game again at 40-37. That score held until McCreadie beat three defenders for a putback layup to make it 42-37 with 4:09 left. The Hornets seemed comfortably ahead at 45-37 with 1:20 to go, but the Lions had one more run in them, getting threes from Gannon Leach and Vaughn to draw within 46-43 with 29.2 seconds on the clock.
Inbounding from the right corner on his own end of the court, Chris Janney threw the ball to Bennett near midcourt, who–despite being almost sandwiched between two defenders–caught it, turned, and threw it to McCreadie near the 3-point line. McCreadie then bounced a pass to a wide open Bryson Montag, who was unguarded on the left side of the basket. Montag laid it in, Cottage Grove came up empty on its last possession, and Henley escaped with the win.
With the Hornets’ first four contests being decided by at least 20 points, Hammond said playing close games on back-to-back days was helpful for his team.
“You can’t replicate this stuff in practice,” Hammond said. “To be able to do these things that we’re doing [in the] last two minutes of the game…that’s why we play these games.”
Bennett finished with 19 points, 3 rebounds and 2 steals for Henley, with McCreadie adding 17 points, 6 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals and 3 blocks. Other contributors for the Hornets were Owen Harper with 3 points and 2 assists; Lane Frank with 3 points and 2 rebounds; Bryson Montag with 2 points, 5 rebounds and 1 block; Chris Janney with 2 points, 4 assists and 3 steals; and Aiden Hayes with 2 points, 4 assists and 2 blocks.
For Cottage Grove, Landon Vaughn and Trevor Cooper each had 13 points, Gannon Leach had 9, and Cole Kishen had 8.
The Henley boys host Yreka (CA) (3-4) in their home opener at 7 p.m. Tuesday.