Had a great time Friday next at the girls playoff basketball game. The game was at Lincoln High School in downtown Portland. The winner would advance to the final 8 and get to play at the Chiles Center at the University of Portland. So anyways, it was a big game.

Here is the article that was in the paper about it, then I'll bore you with my details:

http://www.oregonlive.com/prepgirlsbasketball/.../sports/1109509007307170.xml

Tualatin, not known for our fan support, brought truckloads of fans to the game. I was really surprised at the turnout, especially from the students. Anywho, we had a lot of people in the gym and I think Lincoln was surprised because they all had trouble parking (we came early because we're stupid little suburban kids and don't know our way around the scary city).

We jumped out to an early 11-2 lead and it looked like perhaps the game was all but over. Well, then we started to go cold, not able to hit any shots and they had this one big girl who absolutly dominated us inside. By halftime it was 30-25 Lincoln. Some of the chants between the student sections during this time:

"You are losing!" - Them, at us for booing their cheerleaders (we were down three)
"It's all over!" -Us, jokingly of course
"Just like football!"- Them... very clever. They eliminated us from the playoffs in football last fall.

All the good chants were in the 2nd half. Although one kid on their side got thrown out for flipping us off and another for yelling bad words at the ref.

Both student sections were very loud and it was amazing that so many people turned out for this game. Anywho, to start the 2nd half we continued to suck and they continued to roll. "The Beast," as she was named, continued to pour points in for Lincoln. They were up by 17 with a minute and a half to go in the quarter. We FINALLY started to hit some shots, and cut it to ten by the start of the 4th.

You could feel something in the air, like Tualatin had a comeback in them. And guess what, they did. They stormed back, nailing threes and creating a bunch of turnovers with their full court press. Lincoln looked exhausted and frustrated, while we were getting layups and open jumpers. We came all the way back to take the lead (big explosion from the crowd on that shot) only to have them take it back.

Anyways, it was tied and Holly, from our team, was fouled. She goes to the line to shoot her freethrows...

"Hoooooollllllllllllllyyyyyy.... Hollllllyyyyyy" they chant.

Swish.

"Holly! Holly! Holly!" -Us

Swish.

She turns around and gives a "hahaha, nice" look to us.

We continue to trade buckets, but this time it is about 95 degrees in the gym and we are all sweating but nobody cares. We, obviously, stood all game and towards the end where jumping up and down and yelling. It takes a lot out of you, I'm telling ya, especially when it's like a suana in there.

Oh, and one timeout during this comeback where Lincoln could tell they were fucked, we chanted "Why so quiet?" to which... they were quiet.

"Tualatin took the lead for good, 60-57, on Holly Mengis' three-point basket with 1:37 left."

-From the article

What that fails to mention is the roof almost exploded from the top of the building when that shot went down. From there we rolled to a 65-59 victory... coming back from 17 down in only 9 minutes of play.

Okay, so I kinda freaked out a little bit in this post. It was just really fun because of the amazing comeback. It made winning the game so much more fun... although during the 2nd and 3rd quarters I was very pissed and thinking we were going to lose.

Some pictures:

Yesterday I went on a field trip to "Death of a Salesman" playing at the Artists Repertory Theatre (ART) downtown. The trip consisted of some 200 students from various English and drama classes. The theater was very cool and had an interesting setup:



As you can see in this poorly compressed JPG, it was a slim stage with seating on either side. The side I sat on was only 5 rows deep, the oppisite was only 6, so it was a very intimate setting. The actors were really good and being so close to the play was awesome. Anyways it kept my attention and was very well preformed, I quite enjoyed it. Oh, and all those exits were for actors, except the one perpendicular to the state, which they used to, but is also where us patrons file in. This let characters pop up all around the stage and spiced things up.

Later that night I went to the girls 1st round playoff game against Sandy. They brought A LOT of students, probably matching the number of Tualatin students (they are an hour away). But we shut them up pretty quick, taking a big lead and never letting it go. Their side would chant "Airball! Airball!" or "Ohhhhhh! You got swatted! You got swatted!" or something and we'd just come back with "Scoreboard! Scoreboard! Scoreboard!" and all point to the scoreboard. Pretty funny. Towards the end when they saw they were going to lose, they started to chant "Spoiled Rich Kids," which I thought was pretty clever (and true), and of course we came back with "You are poor!" Classsssy!

Anyways, it was really fun and a great atmosphere. This Saturday we play at Lincoln in the 2nd round, and they have a really wild crowd, Cameron Crazies at Duke esque. Should be fun, me and Kenny are going to go. If we can get past them, then we probably get a rematch with Lake Oswego.

Boys won their final game tonight and are in the playoffs as the 2nd seed out of the Pac-9. We either play @ Benson or @ Lincoln for the 1st round, and will lose either way.

Well I found out today that if you are an upperclassman (Junior or Senior) you have to make varsity in order to play tennis. Wasn't the case last year, but this year like 20 freshmen signed up and they want to "build for the future." So all these shitty little freshmen who SUCK will get to play but I won't. I could still play if I make varsity, but there's no chance in hell that's happening. Going to get my $150 dollars back tomorrow. Good thing though is that I'll be back on my normal schedule and not be getting home at 7:30 every night. Seriously, I could kick 90% of those freshmen asses.

Well, I had a fun time on our trip to Mt. Bachelor. My dad and I went with one of his work friends and his son, who is a year older than I am. We've known each other since I was really little so it wasn't like a complete stranger.

Anywho, my dad's friend doesn't know how to drive. For example, a turn around a steep mountain corner is not one smooth motion with the steering wheel, but rather 10 small turns, the car jerking along. Some with accelerating... he couldn't keep a constant speed, instead choosing to step on the gas every 5 seconds to make up for lost speed. Anyways, the ride was bad but we got to Bend safely none the less.

We stayed at a pretty crappy hotel and it was the brunt of many-o-jokes along the trip. Us boys actually got a pretty nice room though, it was big and had a full kitchen. Not that we used it or anything, but we did go to the store and keep good in the fridge to eat.

We woke up at 7:30 on Saturday and headed to the mountain. It just so happens that President's Day weekend is the busiest two days of the whole year, and although it was crowded, it was still nothing like Meadows on a weekend. We rented skis, which were the latest and greatest, and headed up the mountain.

I was surprised how I was able just to step back into skis 12 months later, different style that last time, and start right off. Normally it takes me a run or two to get back my "skills" but I was cutting turns and flying down right off the bat. Anywho, the weather was okay, it was overcast and a little windy at the top, but once you got down into the trees the wind stopped and you could see really well, so it wasn't like a whiteout or anything.

I spend the majority of my day on Northwest Express, which houses all black diamond (advanced runs). It is a really awesome lift, rising 2450' veritcal feet and having a wide range of runs. One of the best, and I skiied it many times, was Atkeson's Zoom. It seriously may be the best run in the history of the world. Once you drop down into it, it's a narrow "chute" that winds through the forest, has some really steep and exhiliarating drops and a long run-out at the end. Basically, you can fly down the thing at 60mph and hardly have to worry about crashing because it is so well groomed. Here it is on the map:



Anyways, we planned on skiing Sunday too, but the weather wasn't the greatest and my dad's knee hurt, so we bagged it.

One of my favorite parts of the trip was when my dad's friend started to rip on snowmobiles. The guy is just about as far from an environmentalist as you can get, but he thought snowmobiling was about the stupid thing.

"Why don't those lazy idiots strap a couple of skis to the bottom of their feet instead of polluting the air and disturbing wildlife?"

But then they started talking about how two cycle engines were crappy and weren't effecient or something, and that's when I left. Because really, I'd rather stab myself slowly with a sharp blade than listen to engine chat.

Anywho, that was my weekend.

Going skiing at Mt. Bachelor for the weekend. Will be home Sunday night, and I'll have a post telling all about it. :o

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6981361/

Pretty cool. We'll have to wait until at least 2009 to see if this proves true, and even then we might not be able to actually visit the places we want. Landing a human team on Mars would fix that... yeah... we should do that.