Salem, Or.- This was a back and forth battle as we expected in the first quarter. However, Salem Academy took off and Yamhill-Carlton could never catch up. This YC team has been so close in games against Dayton, Amity and Salem Academy earlier this season and just couldn’t put together the last two minutes of each of those games against these top tier programs earlier in the season. Tonight was not one of those night as Salem Academy was up by at least 17 most of the night. Yamhill-Calton deploys up to four freshmen in some stretches and when these players mature and progress throughout the next summer this team will likely be one of the teams to beat in 3A for the next 3-4 years.
This game started out fast with Salem Academy Scoring at will, but Yamhill-Carlton kept on responding and made this game really close the first four minutes of the quarter before Salem Academy responded going up by 8 late in the first quarter before YC hit a three to cut it to 5. This was a really high scoring first period as both teams were shooting very well. Salem Academy ended the Quarter up by 5 and it seemed like they should have been up 10 with how hot they were shooting.
Salem Academy continues to shoot lights out as they lead by as much as 20 in this second Quarter. Salem Academy continued to play solid defense contesting each shot well and rebounded tremendously. The score going into Halftime would be Salem Academy 45-27 over Yamhill-Carlton. We thought this would be a much closer game to this point and figured it would be a 5 point game as YC has competed with everyone in the last 3 weeks. This shows us that Salem Academy deserves to be the number one team in 3A as they are in the best league in 3A and they are the best team in it.
This game was decided in this quarter, SA continued to score at will and pushed this lead to over 22 points at one time in the Third Quarter and YC couldn’t put a run together to make this game close. Going into the fourth quarter this was a 64-45 advantage for Salem Academy who looks to stay undefeated in league play as they play Amity on Feb 7.
Austin Miller scored 22 points 7 rebounds Luke Miller scored 21 points and 7 rebounds and Benett Bos contributed 19 points and 5 rebounds powering their way to an easy victory over Yamhill-Carlton. This win means they only need to win one more league game and they will be League Champs in 2020.
The Final Score was Salem Academy 81-64