A wild story has emerged from the arena of Oregon high school hoops, as a player in the state tournament was unfortunately unable to play when a cheerleader did a back handspring and accidentally kicked him right in the face.
What was meant to be a celebratory occasion during player introductions quickly turned into a grim situation. The last thing you want before a big-time matchup is a case of friendly fire. In the case of Barlow High School, they lost one of their seniors from this blooper in what would’ve been his penultimate game at the prep level.
Although Sentori Martino wasn’t able to suit up for this one, Barlow came away with a 69-39 blowout victory over Jesuit, so at least his teammates rallied around his absence to get the dub there.
I just feel bad for the cheerleader. She had no idea Martino was going to be right behind her. Isn’t there enough room somewhere else on the court to tumble like that? Surely the spacing could be better thought-out than this. Maybe it’ll serve as a cautionary tale to avoid similar accidents in the future. That’s all we can really hope for. You hate to see a young teen’s end to his high school hoops career derailed, especially on something that didn’t happen in a game.
Martino was unable to play in Saturday morning’s final consolation match in Oregon boys’ 6A tournament. Nevertheless, Barlow got the win there, too, by a score of 61-58 over Grant to secure fourth place. Shout out to the OSAA’s website for giving me the lowdown on these box scores.
In the spirit of promoting young student-athletes, and to end this kind of depressing blooper reel on a more positive note, it’s worth spotlighting Sentori Martino a bit. Remember those “Faces in the Crowd” write-ups from Sports Illustrated back in the day? That’s the idea here. While I can’t find much of anything on Martino’s basketball achievements, he’s a straight-up baller on the football field. This season, Martino was a first-team all-conference selection as a wide receiver and defensive back, and was a second-teamer as a returner. Not too shabby!
Totally gonna take “FIRST!” credit if Martino walks on to Oregon or Oregon State and becomes a college football star. In the meantime, hope he gets better soon.
