Outlaws nip Mollala on the hardwood

The Outlaws battled back several times in their hard-fought game against Molalla on Friday, December 4, and in the end came out on top with a 63-62 victory.

Coach Rand Runco said, "Molalla had several upper classmen and played a five out three point shooting up tempo offense."

Sisters struggled at the start of the game and at one point in the first quarter trailed Molalla 18-8. The Outlaws refused to give up and tied the game 19-19 at the end of the quarter.

The lead changed several times throughout the game, but in the end the Outlaws earned the win.

Sisters was only 11/21 from the line, which kept the score much closer than it should have been.

John Erickson led the Outlaws with 21 points. Drew Harrison had seven boards and dished out five assists. Jalen Millen had five assists and five steals in the game.

Runco said, "I'm happy with our improvement, but we have a long way to go to be where we want to be. We have a pre-season filled with top teams and must work hard to reach our potential. It looks like we have a very scrappy team that learns quickly and showed a lot of heart in our first two games."

Four days earlier Sisters suffered a 38-35 loss against Stayton in their first basketball game of the season. It was an exciting game, with multiple lead changes throughout the contest. Stayton used a Princeton offense that slowed the tempo of the game way down, but Sisters played good team defense against the very difficult Eagle offense. Jalen Miller and Rodney Warner led the Outlaws with eight points each, and John Erickson contributed six assists.

"Jalen (Miller) played great defense against Coby Proctor, who is one of the best point guards in the state," said Runco. "This was the first night of real varsity playing time for most of the Outlaws, and I was happy with our competiveness and team intensity. We struggled offensively and the game was really wild, but the Outlaws showed a lot of promise."

The Outlaws played at home against Summit on Tuesday, December 8. On Thursday, December 10, Sisters will travel to Cascade for a 7 p.m. game.