Lake Oswego 72, Oregon City 55 Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Landon Ainge flies towards the basket over Matt Hollands of Oregon City during the Lakers' 72-55 win over the Pioneers on Tuesday. With the win, their 11th in as many league games, Lake Oswego clinched first place in the Three Rivers League. They will have a bye in the first round of the playoffs, which begin next week.

This was to be the game of the week in Oregon boys basketball. It was the last regular season home game for Lake Oswego and their star senior, Kevin Love, and their opponents for the game, the Pioneers, are the only team that could really challenge the Lakers. And the fans came out—I estimated more than 500 in the stands, including a sizable contingent rooting for Oregon City.

I haven't seen the stats on this game yet, but Landon Ainge was the player of the game for me. Yeah, Kevin Love was there and scored a bunch of points even though he was double-teamed for the whole game. But Ainge seemed to be making plays every time I looked at him, especially in the first half.

For those of you who are out of the loop, Kevin Love is a two-time Oregon player of the year and All American, one of the hottest basketball prospects in the country. The 6-10 post has committed to playing for UCLA next year.

I don't want to suggest that Love was bad—he scored a bunch of points, made almost all of his free throws, and collected a bunch of rebounds. But he definitely seemed uninterested tonight.

Of course, Lake Oswego was never in any danger of losing the game. They started with a 9-0 run, and were up by 14 at the end of the first quarter. From there on, they coasted with a 12+ point lead for the rest of the game.

Unfortunately, Ainge suffered some kind of foot- or leg injury as time expired, and had to be carried off the court. It didn't seem to be life-threatening, but that's as much as I could tell.

(Incidentally, if Landon's name sounds familiar, it's because he's the nephew of Boston Celtics' legend Danny Ainge. Kevin Love's basketball lineage is almost as impressive—his dad, Stan, also played in the NBA. And then there's his Uncle Mike, who used to sing with some California surf band. Honest.)

Basketball playoffs begin next week, culminating with the championship tournaments March 7-10.