Cards Rally Late But Come Up Short in 60-50 Loss

PASCO - Waitsburg- Prescott nearly overcame a 16-point third quarter deficit to pull off a road win against league foe Tri-Cities Prep here Saturday. Sadly, the Cardinals run ran out of gas late, and the Jaguars escaped with a 60-50 victory.

The two sides appeared evenly matched through the first four minutes. Owen Lanning's basket-and-free- throw at 4:02 gave the Cards the lead 8-6. It was the last lead the Cardinals would hold.

Tri-Cities Prep reeled off 20 of the game's next 25 points to build a 27-13 lead with 5:36 left in the first half. A late push by the Cards cut the lead to seven, but Josh Guajardo's 3-pointer at the halftime buzzer pushed the lead back to 10, 34-24.

WP emerged from the locker room late after no one reportedly gave the team time warnings during the 10-minute intermission. Whether or not the lack of warm-up hurt WP is a mat- ter of debate. What is not, is TCP opening the half on an 8-2 run that gave the Jaguars their biggest lead of the game, 16, at 42-26.

WP trimmed the margin to nine thanks to treys by Dalton Estes and Stirling Eastman, another deuce by Eastman and an inside buck- et by Seth Deal versus two Prep free throws and a field goal by Briar Westerfield. Estes also added a free throw in the run, though he missed two others when he was fouled on a second 3-point attempt during the run.

Buckets by Bailey Rivas and Brady Ver Steeg put the Jags back up 13 with 1:00 left in the third. That's when the Cards lit into their most dominating series of possessions of the night.

Devin Acevedo made a lay-in on a hard baseline drive and was fouled. Ace- vedo made his free throw. Estes followed with a dou- ble-clutch 2-point jumper from outside at :04 of the third quarter. Acevedo bur- ied two more shots from the line a minute into the fourth after being fouled on another slashing drive. Then after two missed 3-point attempts, Lanning's deuce from the right wing brought the Cards to within four 50-46 with five minutes remaining.

But TCP persevered. Ver Steeg ended the four minute Jag scoreless streak with a single free throw at 4:21. Anthony Perez followed with two more free throws to quiet the WP side. Acevedo returned to the line to bury two more charity stripers, cutting the lead back to five, but another Rivas basket and a Perez foul-and-one 3-point play iced the game for TCP.

Acevedo finished the game a perfect 5-for-5 from the line.

Lanning led all scorers with 15, while Eastman added eight points and four steals. Logan Dozier tallied 12 boards. TCP's trio of Perez, Rivas, and Ver Steeg all scored in double figures with 13, 12, and 12 points respectively.

"Our big guys got in foul trouble and that really changed the first quarter up to halftime," WP coach Tavis Crittenden said. "We just aren't that physically deep in our bigs. After that we gave up a lot of jump shots.

"We made a good run there in the fourth quarter, but we wouldn't get into an offense," continued Crit- tenden. "Everybody just wanted to score and we didn't slow down when we had five minutes left and we were only down by four. We called two timeouts, but we wouldn't get into any offensive set that we called. That's discouraging. But the guys played with 100 percent effort tonight. They worked their butts off. I'm proud of that aspect."

WP falls to 3-12 on the season and 1-5 in league play. The Cards play again Friday night as they host Dayton in Waistburg. WP also plays Saturday at Asotin.