EUGENE, Ore. — The Bushnell Beacons won their home opener against the Linfield Wildcats 89-70. It was a physical and competitive game with both teams going on runs. Bushnell was able to prolong its offense while shutting down the Linfield motion offense, leading to a dominant win to start the home season.
Bushnell (1-1) came in looking to rebound from its first loss of the season, facing the Linfield Wildcats, who made their season debut with their brand new coach and Bushnell graduate, Elijah Gurash. Both teams looked to make a statement early in the year.
Bushnell won the tip and quickly got a bucket from Kaleb Burnett, then Linfield responded with a bucket of its own. The Wildcats proceeded to make the next four 3-pointers while the Beacons got their buckets in the paint. There was aggressive defense on both sides, with blocking fouls called on both teams.
After a made layup for Bushnell by Burnett made it 17-14, Linfield missed a 3-pointer. Bushnell, on the way up the court, had a pass picked off by Linfield guard Max Juhala. On the way down, he landed on his lower body wrong and immediately went down in extreme pain. Medical staff quickly rushed to him. Followed by his parents and his coaches at his side, Juhala stayed down waiting for medical experts to show up, as this injury could not be handled by just ice. Paramedics arrived on the scene after 15 minutes and applied an air cast. Best wishes and a speedy recovery to Juhala as he left to a standing ovation.
After the scary moment, both teams had to reset. Linfield started it off with a big 3-pointer by Gavin Perdue, followed by a splashdown by the Beacons’ Cory Johnson. Bushnell held a six-point lead, 37-31, when Linfield’s undersized guard Chase Bennett hit a big three, making it 37-34. From there, the teams traded buckets in the paint. With two minutes left, Bushnell's Sparky Johnson hit a three to make it 42-38. Then, following a Linfield miss, Burnett went to the line with a chance to get 20 points; he missed one, giving him 19 in the first half. Beacons got the ball back and played for the last shot. Roy Bunn went for the layup but was fouled. He made one at the stripe, missed the second, but Cory Johnson got the rebound and barely missed the buzzer beater, keeping it 46-40 Bushnell at half.
The second started out with a 9-0 Bushnell run, not letting Linfield score until five minutes passed in the second half. The Beacons could do no wrong on offense with the big 3 from Cory Johnson and major success in the paint from Sparky Johnson and Burnett, giving them a 60-45 lead. The Wildcats started to show more fight with an and-one by Bennet. He followed that up with a contested three, giving the Wildcats 52 and the Beacons 68. The buckets kept landing back and forth with all of Linfield's offense running through Bennett and the Beacons spreading the ball around, making most of their points in the paint with size mismatches down low.
The defense of Bushnell shut down Linfield in the paint, only allowing shots from outside the arc. The Kaleb Burnett versus Chase Bennett match-up was active all game, going at each other constantly. After the 10-minute mark passed, the game crept into a defensive lull with both teams missing shots and committing multiple team fouls as the Beacons led by nearly 20.
Bushnell began to ease up in the paint on offense and opted for 3s with Jacob Martinez and Keenan Reckamp both hitting from the outside to light the Beacons’ bench up with energy. Bushnell big man Ashton Harvey was a problem all night for the Linfield offense, shutting down the paint presence while being a force on the offensive side.
The final five minutes were highly contested. Even when the Beacons had a 26-point lead, Linfield was still playing tough defense. Ashton Harvey was fouled three times, making 4-of-6 as the Beacons led 89-65. The backups for Bushnell held the torch and stymied the Linfield offense, only allowing a Kohsuke Fujiwara 3-pointer and a garbage-time layup. The Beacons will be in action again on Wednesday at 7 p.m. when they head to Arizona to take on the Park University Gilbert Buccaneers as part of a two-game road trip.