4th Annual
North Central District "A"
District Boys Basketball Tournament
1961

Champ

ionship

Che

lan

Score

: 62-48

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Oroville 52, Eastmont 46
Game 1. (Loser out)
At Oroville, WA

Danny Iyall's Oroville Hornets brought hope to their fans when they dumped George Stewart's highly-regarded Eastmont Wildcats to stay alive for a chance at the State A basketball tournament.  The Hornets meet Cashmere here Saturday night and that's the big one.
In the preliminary, the Hornets jumped into the lead when, Larry Farmer hit for a two-pointer from the side, Garry Thrasher added another; Howard Mears, a free throw and Joe Seefried another two-pointer before Eastmont's Don Bull dropped in a free throw to put the Wildcats on the scoreboard.  By this time, four minutes and seven seconds of the game were gone.
Dennis Nelson added another field goal before Bob Harpster dropped in Eastmont's first field goal.  The quarter ended with Oroville on the long end of a 12-6 score.
The Hornets opened the second quarter playing the same ball that they played in the first - keep the ball and shoot onl on better-than-average chances; they worked a 3-2 offense against the Wildcats' 1-2-2 zone which sagged into a 3-2 zone at times.
The Wildcats came to life to out-score the Hornets, 12-9, in the second quarter and go into halftime on the short end of a 21-18 score.  The Hornets had missed four out of five from the free throw line that quarter, while the Wildcats were hitting four of five.
The Hornets edged the Wildcats, 14-11, in the third quarter on six field goals and just two from the gift line.  The Wildcats hit four from the floor and all three of their chances from the free throw line.  This put the Hornets into the fourth quarter with a six-point cushion, 35-29.
The fourth quarter was a dead heat - each club scored 17 points.  It was the Hornets' control of the boards which spelled victory for them.  Mears was their big gun on rebounds with Seefried and Thrasher doing yeoman service in the same department.
Monte Battermann and Lloyd Porterfield did most of the Wildcats' rebounding.  Bull for the Wildcats took scoring honors with 16. Farmer hit 14 to lead the Hornets.
The Hornets made their keep-on-the-ball and shoot-only-the-shots pay off as they hit nine-of-19 from the floor in the first half and 10-of-22 in the second to give them a very good 46.5 percent shooting average.
The Wildcats working against the Hornets 2-1-2 zone, could hit but six-of-22 shots in the first half.  In the second half, their shooting percentage picked up to 10-of-24 for a game average of 34.7 percent.

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Chelan 62, Cashmere 48
Game 2. (Championship, winner to state)
At Oroville, WA

In the championship game, the Goats met their ancient Chelan county rivals from Cashmere and more than evened the score for the shellacking they had taken just a week ago by outclassing the Bulldogs.
The Goats went out in front in the opening seconds of the game when James Davis dropped in a field from under the basket and added a free throw before Ron Witten put the Bulldogs on the scoreboard with a one-pointer.  The Goats then went on to drop in three more from the floor before the Bulldogs hit for their first field goal with five minutes and 20 seconds of the first quarter gone.
Jerard Cote dropped it in.
The Goats went into the second quarter leading 16-9.  By halftime, they had piled up a 10-point, 30-20, advantage.
It was the Bulldogs deadly accuracy from the free throw line which kept them in the ball game. In the first half, they hit but four from the floor of 18 taken, the Goats hit 12-of-30.
The Bulldogs came back in the third quarter, to out-score the Goats, 16-14, and go into the last quarter trailing by only eight points, 44-36.  Cote hit a pair of free throws to open the fourth quarter; but the Goats' Kim Kjobech responded with a two-pointer and a pair of three throws before Bill Riggleman struck for the Bulldogs' the first field goal of the period.
From then on, the Goats took charge to outscore the Bulldogs, 48-32, from the floor and Chelan out-rebounded the Bulldogs, 40-28.
Chelan's Roger Girard was the big scoring gun of the tournament, dropping in 20 points. Cote, for the Bulldogs, was just two points away with 18.

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Oroville 55, Cashmere 51
Game 3. (Winner to state, loser out)
At Oroville, WA

An Incredible Comeback!

With practically every hometown fan looking on, the Oroville Hornets staged one of the most unbelievable comebacks of all time to defeat the Cashmere Bulldogs to take second-place in the North Central Class A basketball tournament here Saturday night.
The win sent the Hornets winging into the State Class A tournament for the first time in the school's history.
Down 14 points with just 3:37 left on the clock in the fourth quarter the Hornets started a rally which netted them 15 points while giving up just one free throw to the Bulldogs and send the game into overtime at 50-50.
In the overtime the Hornets racked up five points to the Bulldogs' one.
The black-clad Bulldogs from Cashmere started the first quarter just as though they intended to run the Hornets right out of the gym. The game was only seconds old when Jerard Cote stepped to the free throw line dropped one through from Cashmere.  Seconds later he dropped in a two-pointer.  Ron Witten followed suit moments later. Joe Seefried dropped in a gift shot for Oroville's first point. There were only 3:51 left in the quarter when Garry Thrasher scored Oroville's first field goal.
Cashmere coach Dick McLaren's Bulldogs started the game with a rush. They wanted to run and run they did. To upset the Hornets, keep the ball  and take only the best shooting opportunities.  They put relentless pressure on the Hornet ball handlers from the opening whistle.  This method was successful enough to give them an 18-9 first quarter lead.
The Hornets went to a man-to-man for the first minute of the second quarter and succeeded in slowing down the fast-running Bulldogs.  In that quarter, they outscored Cashmere 11-9 but still trailed by seven going into the halftime intermission.  The first half was a run, run affair with the Hornets losing the ball seven times on turnovers and the Bulldogs nine.
The third quarter was only seconds old when Dennis Nelson dropped in a two-pointer for the Hornets.  Then for the next couple of minutes the game got rougher than an Irish wake.  In those couple of minutes the Bulldogs picked up four fast fouls, but the Hornets could capitalize on but two of them.  Cashmere broke loose in the last half of the quarter to sink eight field goals and one free shot, mostly on baseline driving lay-ins of Lynn MacDonald.  The Bulldogs had almost doubled the score of the Hornets, 17-9, in that quarter.
The three points that separated the teams in the opening seconds of the quarter seemed to be just as close as the Hornets could get.  Going into the fourth quarter they were down 15 points, 44-29.
In the opening seconds of that quarter, Ed Pipkin dropped in a field goal for the Bulldogs. That was to be the last field goal that the Bulldog would sink in the more than seven minutes left in the quarter and the three-minute overtime.
But the world looked rosey to them.  They had a 17-point lead. Seefried hit two from the gift line and Thrasher a field goal to cut the Bulldogs lead to 13.  Witten dropped in a free throw and Cashmere had a 14-point lead with the clock showing just 3:37 left in the game.  Seefried toed the free throw line again and dropped in another pair.  The Bulldogs went into a cold freeze out front.  In an effort to open up what had been for them an almost impregnable Hornet defense.
The Hornet defense came out when Rob Rairdan slapped a Bulldog pass down the floor and beat the Bulldogs to the ball to go in for a lay-in.
On the throw in from out of bounds, the Bulldogs tried a method that had netted them three easy baskets in the third quarter.  Leave one player under the basket and throw a floor-long pass to him, but Howard Mears was waiting for it. He went high in the air and drove in for a lay-in.
For the second time in the quarter, Seefried toed the free throw line to drop in two more. The Bulldogs brought the ball down the floor and continued to work it out front.  A Bulldog pass went out of bounds, the Hornets brought the ball down floor and Rairdan sank a beauty from the side and the Oroville fans went crazy.
The clock showed 2:48 as the Bulldogs brought the ball up-court.  Mears tied up the dribbler and Seefried, on a jumper from the key, cut the Bulldogs lead to five.  Seconds later, Larry Farmer found himself all alone with the ball a good 25 feet out on the right from the basket.  He took a long look at the basket and let go a two-hand howitzer which went through without hardly touching the net.  Every fan in the gym was on his feet and the building could have fallen down without anyone noticing it.  The clock showed 57 seconds with the Hornets covering every possible pass receiver and the Bulldogs could not get the ball in court within the five allotted seconds and Oroville took possession.  The ball came into Farmer who passed cross court to Thrasher.  Thrasher passed into Mears under the basket and, as he went up for the shot, Jim Rasmussen tried to check it from behind and fouled Mears.  The basket was good, and the clock showed 42 seconds.  Mears had chance to tie the game and he did just that.  The Bulldogs elected to stall out the clock and take a last-second shot.  With three seconds left, Witten tried from in front of the key but the shot was short and the game went into overtime.
On the opening jump of the overtime, Mears controlled the jump.  Thrasher whipped a pass into Mears as he drove the baseline for a lay up and the Hornets were ahead for the first time in the ball game.
Cote had a chance to tie it up but missed the first one.  Moments later Thrasher added one point for the Hornets.  Jim Kinkade was fouled as he attempted a shot, hit the first but missed the second and the Hornets were ahead by two.
With 15 seconds showing on the clock, Rairdan toed the gift line and dropped in a pair to clinch the game for the Hornets.  The Bulldogs tried desperately to get into scoring position but could not.
The quietest man in the gym after the game, was Oroville coach Dan Iyall.  All he could say...
"It was the craziest comeback I have ever seen," he said and it was.
For the Hornets, it was a well-deserved win and strickly a team victory. Though the work of Mears and Seefried on the boards and the all-around play of Seefried were outstanding.
Shooting percentages were especially good for this type of game.  The Bulldogs hit 40 percent from the floor and the Hornets 39.6 percent.