By Jeremy McDonald

jeremymcdonald73@gmail.com

PERRYDALE, Ore.–  The Crosshill Christian Boys Basketball team did all they could do to keep the Pirates of Perrydale at bay in Wednesday night’s 1A Casco League match-up.  Leading by as much as 15-3 to start the game, ten at half and nine going into the fourth quarter of Perrydale’s 46-43 Senior Night victory.

But something just clicked in that final frame of that game.  The Eagles led 38-29 going into the final frame with them steadily in control of the game throughout, but all-of-sudden, it seemed like someone called in for the ships in that bay to make their move inward.

Perhaps Kamren Poulson and Lucas Thorson were like Barbosa and Jack Sparrow from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, leading the Perrydale charge as the duo paced the Pirates in the comeback that all was missing was the Pirates Theme to go with the 19-7 run that the squad had to close out the game.

For Poulson, he wasn’t going to let his senior night go to waste as he scored five of the Pirates first ten points.  Thorson had two and Conner Graber contributed another three with Perrydale drawing close to Crosshill, eventually pulling ahead off a pair of Thorson free throws.  That’s when the junior Thorson took over, scoring the next six points for Perrydale with the home squad embarking on a wild fight at sea for the win up 45-40 with a minute left in the game after Thorson’s latest free throw attempt.

“I really thought to myself, ‘I’m not playing the greatest right now.  I just need to step it up on defense and it’ll move it over to offense,” Poulson said of him stepping up on his Senior Night.  “We wanted to win this game, it’s senior night, I wanted it to be a special game because I’m a senior.  It was important to win this gameWe had to make sure we dug deep and fought for it.”

“It was a big mental game for us,” adds Thorson.  “I didn’t let (the deficit) get to me.  I always like to stay positive and keep a good mindset, but I don’t think it affected us at all.  We knew we were still in it and we could come back, it was a matter of how much we wanted it.”

How much they wanted it was put to the test on the following possession as Ben Helemstrand hit a bigtime three-pointer for Crosshill Christian.  The three brought the Eagles back to within two of Perrydale with 37.8 remaining in the game.

The crowd was electrifying.  It felt like a tight game at Baker High School for the 1A State Playoffs.  A good test nonetheless for both teams who will more than likely make it to the State Postseason after next week’s Casco League playoffs.

“It was electrifying in here.  Everytime  they make a bucket you can’t hear anything.  When they scored those last few free throws, you couldn’t hear a dang thing, it was so loud in here,” the Eagles Noah Dallum said.  “I think it’s good to get prepared and get ready for that kind of pressure.  We got to be ready for anything…handling the pressure of the crowd and handling that defense because it’s either we’re going to play them again for our next game or we’ll play Willamette Valley (Christian).  Willamette Valley has a swarming defense, so we got to be ready for anything.”

The Eagles had already locked up the number one spot for league playoffs that are next weekend as they wrap-up the regular season Saturday at Damascus Christian.  The Pirates play at C.S. Lewis Academy on Friday before hosting the Warriors of WVC next Thursday, February 16.

As for the finish to this one on Wednesday, Perrydale survived a last second scrambling to seal the victory and sail their seniors off to the Sunset with the regular season coming to a close and the real fun of playoffs on the horizon.

“It was tough.  It was mostly defense and finishing our free throws, a lot of simple things like that.  All the fundamentals that went hand-and-hand,” Thorson described finishing the game.

Thorson finished with 14 points, as did Poulson to lead Perrydale.  Dallum led all scorers with 25 points with Zach Sands contributing another eight for the Eagles.

Photos By Jeremy McDonald