Portland cools off Birds

DECATUR — Backed by hot pitching on a cool, breezy Thursday night, the Portland Rockets downed the Decatur Dirty Birds 5-1.
South Adams High School graduate Dan Bollenbacher tore through the Dirty Birds, giving up only one hit and one walk while fanning five in five innings.
Devin Wilburn took over in relief and kept Decatur under control, surrendering four hits and one run in the final four innings.
The game went scoreless through five innings until the Rockets loaded the bases in the top of the sixth. A bases-loaded walk brought the first run across, and another scored on a groundout.
Portland tacked on three more runs in the seventh, two off of errors and another on a RBI single by Dalton Tinsely.
The Rockets improved to 11-5 with the win, their second victory over Decatur this year, having beaten them 2-0 at home earlier this month.

Eels top two
WINCHESTER — In a meet shortened because of the weather, Fort Recovery topped a pair of opponents.
The Eels summer swim team scored 1,419 points Thursday to defeat Union City (887) and host Randolph County (787).
Sisters Carley and Cori Stone led the effort for Fort Recovery with two wins apiece. Carley took the 11-12-year-old girls butterfly and backstroke while Cori won the 15-and-older girls long freestyle and butterfly.
Ava Bubp added victories in the 8-and-younger girls long freestyle and butterfly, and Marshall Hull was first in the 15-and-older boys backstroke and butterfly.

Terre Haute hosting
INDIANAPOLIS — Commissioner Bobby Cox announced Thursday that Terre Haute will play host to the 2012 IHSAA Girls Basketball State Finals.The event, which has been held at Allen County War Memorial Coliseum in Fort Wayne each of the last two seasons, will be played at Indiana State University’s Hulman Center. Fort Wayne and Evansville sites were also in the running to host the state finals.

Qualified for rodeo
Michael Vanover Shreeve recently earned a position on the Indiana National Junior High Rodeo Team and will be competing in the National Junior High Finals Rodeo.
Vanover Shreeve, a seventh grader at East Jay Middle School, will compete in bull riding, team roping and breakaway roping at the event June 26 through July 2 in Gallup, N.M. More than $75,000 in prize money and $100,000 in college scholarships are given away at the event.
For more information, visit www.nhsra.org.
SAHS awarded
South Adams High School was selected recently as the winner of the Red Gold IHSAA Sportsmanship Award winner for the 2011 spring sports season.
The award “recognizes the outstanding efforts of an individual school that promotes good sportsmanship in all areas of its high school athletes program.” The school was honored and awarded $2,000 during the IHSAA Baseball State Finals Saturday at Victory Field in Indianapolis.

Junior League
Both Portland Junior League Rookie softball games Wednesday were decided by a single run.
Justice Day led Persimmon Ridge to a 15-14 victory over Loy Real Estate and Auction while Jayden Claytor powered First Merchants Bank past Portland Optimist by the same score.
Also Wednesday, First Merchants completed a 10-2 win over Optimist as they finished a June 10 game that had been suspended because of lightning.
Day racked up five hits, five runs and three RBIs in the victory for Persimmon Ridge. Leah Hummel added five hits, four RBIs and a run.
Claytor scored the game-winning run in the 15-14 win for First Merchants and finished with three hits, three RBIs and two runs. Brianna Lothridge totaled three hits, three runs and two RBIs in the 10-2 victory.[[In-content Ad]]