By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

STAYTON, Ore.–   It’s starting to look like the Santiam Boys Basketball team might be the sleeper team out of the Tri-River Conference as they picked up another massive win.  Taking down Regis 58-57 Tuesday night on the road just days after their massive win over Kennedy. 

And Ezra Downey, coming off of the injury list, picked up where he left off.  Scoring 23 points in the win as the two TRC squads went back-and-forth before the Wolverines edged the Rams in the final minutes to get the win and handing Regis their first league defeat of the season as the Boys From The Canyon improve to 3-0 in league play and 8-3 on the year.

“Having two great league wins like this against two top teams in 2A is absolutely big, it’s really nice for sure.  The momentum is just going to keep going and we’re just getting started, our goal is to win league and we’re doing everything we can to reach that (goal) for sure,” Downey said.  “This is a fan friendly game (tonight), entertaining through and through.  It takes heart, it was all heart.

It was an intense game.  Playoff Pendleton-like.  The heart.  The passion made it a fun game with a lot of adversity at hand as the two squads head their separate ways only to meet again soon enough down the road.

“It’s fun, I mostly enjoy close games where it’s neck-and-neck…it’s just more fun for me.  It’s sad it didn’t go our way,” said Regis’ Diego Aguilar.  “Overall it should help us a lot.  Use it as fuel, it’s a learning experience for when we’re up five or however much, just get those key stops and increase our lead instead of letting them score and getting them back into the game.

Aguilar finished with 23 points for the Rams with Isaiah Koehnke adding another 11 in the close defeat.  Gage Twede (13), Jesse Dana (10) and Xaiver Vital (10) each scored in double-figures for the Wolverines.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald