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ONALASKA — With three minutes remaining in their game at Onalaska on Thursday, the Winlock Cardinals were down 11 points and were staring down a 1-5 record.
Three minutes later, after a sudden and shocking rally, the Cardinals were celebrating their 49-48 comeback victory, one that snapped a three-game losing streak.
“It’s huge for these guys,” Winlock coach Rich Cline said. “It’s been tough for us, but hopefully this can get us going in the right direction.”
The Cardinals had scored just 35 points in the first 29 minutes of the game, but a quick bucket from Landen Cline and a three from Carter Svenson cut the deficit to six and forced an Onalaska timeout with 2:17 to play.
The Loggers had to take another timeout just 46 seconds after a pair of turnovers led to another pair of Winlock buckets.
“It started off on the defensive end,” Cline said. “We got some stops, then we made some shots. That was huge for us there.”
With just over 30 seconds remaining, Cline hit another layup to tie the game at 45.
The Loggers had the chance to take the final shot, but instead turned the ball over and fouled Freddy Patching, who went to the line and made both free throws to give Winlock the lead.
Another turnover on the inbound led to a pair of free throws from Jaxyn Pelagio, which made it a four-point game, and a buzzer-beating three didn’t change the final outcome.
“Right when we think we were gonna take it away, some runs, bad fouls, and some undisciplined stuff just got us,” Onalaska coach Fred Sturza said.
It wasn’t the first time on Thursday that Winlock had made a run when trailing.
Onalaksa hit a flurry of threes in the first quarter to take a 12-3 lead, but the Cardinals responded by outscoring Onalaska 19-9 in the second to take a 22-21 lead at halftime.
“We wanted to play fast,” Sturza said. “We wanted to get wide and create spacing, and we got a great look at a handful of things. Then we kind of got greedy.”
The back-and-forth trend continued into the third, where Winlock scored just five points, and it looked like Onalaska was ready to put the finishing touches on a victory when Noland Brady pushed the lead to double-digits with three minutes remaining.
The four Cardinals who scored during the late rally were the only four to score throughout the night. Winlock has been missing center Lincoln Ruiz since the first game of the season, and Cline said that the balanced approach is something that they’ve been missing during his absence.
“It’s something we have to do,” Cline said. “You put it in the hands of your playmakers, and they got it done … For us to come out and do something like this without (Ruiz), that’s huge. I’m proud of my boys.”
It’s been a tough opening stretch of the season for Winlock, which has already played six games in just nine days. The Cardinals had lost four of their first five coming into Thursday, but Cline expects this win to be something they can build on.
“I think this will catapult us and keep us going in the direction we need to go,” Cline said.
It’s the opposite for Onalaska, at least from a scheduling perspective, as Thursday was its season opener. While it was a tough game to let slip away for loss No. 1, Sturza kept the message positive postgame.
“I’m proud of the guys,” Sturza said. “It’s our first one, they played hard, and they did exactly what I wanted to. If we can start reducing those mistakes, we’re gonna look pretty good out there.”
Case McGraw led the team with 16 points, while Blaze Underhill and Justin Jacoby added six each. Jacoby also hauled in 14 rebounds, while Cooper Lawrence grabbed 11 and McGraw tallied 10.
The Loggers (0-1, 0-1 C2BL) will be back in action Friday at home against Napavine, while Winlock (2-4, 1-3 C2BL) will return home to host Mossyrock on Saturday.
