JUNCTION CITY — When Philomath junior Esias Sapp drilled a 3-pointer for a 12-point lead with 3:23 remaining in the third quarter, a sense of excitement hung in the air with the prospect that the Warriors were going to knock off a pretty good Junction City squad on the road.
At the same time, there was also the feeling that the Tigers weren’t going to roll over and would likely put up a fight until the end.
Gallery: PHS boys basketball at Junction City (Dec. 23, 2025)
A collection of photos from Philomath High’s 52-49 boys basketball win at Junction City on Tuesday.
Indeed, Junction City (6-2) mounted a comeback in the fourth quarter and had a chance to send the game into overtime on the final shot. But a 3-point attempt from the corner bounced off the rim and Philomath got out of town with a 52-49 victory.
“We can compete with all these other teams,” PHS sophomore guard Dreyton Nuño said afterward. “In the beginning, we didn’t play our best games. And like JC, they’re a good team and we just beat them, you know, even when it was a seven-against-five situation.”
Nuño had one of his best performances of the season on both ends of the floor. Nuño finished with 11 points, including a key basket with 4:43 remaining that put the Warriors up 48-42.
“We can go far and I feel like we just kind of flipped a switch from we’re not a very good team to hey, we’ve got this,” Nuño said about the team, which evened its season record at 4-4.
(Photo by Andy Cripe/Philomath News)
The Warriors have now won three straight.
“It was a good win, they’re a pretty good team,” Ecker said. “They’re always physical and get after it and we survived a lot of adversity tonight, some things happened and we stuck with it.”
Ecker’s reference to adversity involves what he saw as questionable calls by the officials, something also mentioned by Nuño with his seven-on-five comment. The biggest call occurred with 7 seconds remaining with the Warriors clinging to a three-point lead. Junction City needed to foul to try to force Philomath to the free-throw line in hopes of getting the ball one more time for a chance to score. On the play, Warriors junior Kaden Howard caught an in-bounds pass and appeared to have been pushed by a Junction City player out of bounds. The official, however, did not see a foul and ruled that Howard stepped out, which resulted in a turnover and gave the home team a chance for a final shot to try to tie the game.
Sapp was another player that showed up well during the contest with 11 of his 16 points in the second half. None of his points were bigger than the basket he scored with 1:30 remaining when Philomath was leading by just one point. On the play, Nuño missed on a 3-point attempt but Sapp positioned himself for the rebound and scored on a layup to extend the Warriors lead to three.
“Esias did a nice job attacking the defense,” Ecker said. “His 3 wasn’t hitting much in the second half so he drove a little bit and was able to find guys open.
As a team, Philomath committed a season-low 12 turnovers.
“They brought some pressure and some run-and-jump stuff at us the first part of the game and we handled it pretty well,” Ecker said.
Philomath’s defense appeared to force the Tigers to try to find points more from the outside.
“We did a pretty good job getting up in them a little bit and keeping them in front of us,” Ecker said. “It wasn’t something where they’d get around us and get a wide open lane.”
Ecker referred to a play when the Tigers were trying to make something happen in the paint.
“They were trying to go inside and go after Esias and there was a timeout,” Ecker said. “We said, ‘hey, you’ve got to protect Esias, you’ve got to go down and help … and we wouldn’t have been as successful if we didn’t do that, so the guys did a pretty good job of reaching down and getting them to kick it back out or throw it away.”
Junction City senior guard Aden McNamar led his team in scoring with 17 points.
For the Warriors, Sapp and Nuño were the lone players to finish in double digits on the offensive end but several other players had key baskets, including nine tough-nosed points inside by junior Jamin Peters. Sophomore Cole Barron had a couple of baskets early when Junction City was trying to build a lead, junior Hamish McConnell hit a 3-pointer in the second quarter and both Howard and senior Ace Gerding put in quality minutes.
“We have a couple of different offenses that we run and I think both of them were pretty successful,” Ecker said. “On the defensive end, we started in the zone just to throw them off a little bit but they were able to find some weak spots and we didn’t guard the high post.”
Ecker was annoyed with those results after the team had worked on that exact part of its game the previous day in practice.
“For whatever reason, we couldn’t get a guy to go to the high post and stop that guy,” Ecker said. “So we had to get out of that but we did better, we went man-to-man and we outscored them in the same quarter.”
As for Nuño and his performance, he credited teammates with helping smooth the road to the finish.
“We had a timeout and my teammates were telling me, ‘oh, you’ve got this, stay calm, you’re good, poise, poise,’” Nuño said. “Just the reassurance and words of encouragement from them is super helpful — it’s huge for me to keep coming.”
Philomath will next play this coming weekend at a tournament in Scappoose. The Warriors are scheduled to play games against Marshfield at 7 p.m. Saturday and against the host school at 5 p.m. Sunday.
Philomath 52, Junction City 49
Tuesday, Dec. 23, at Junction City HS
PHILOMATH (52)
Dreyton Nuño 5 1-1 11, Kaden Howard 2 0-2 4, Esias Sapp 6 2-2 16, Cole Barron 3 1-2 7, Jamin Peters 4 1-1 9, Hamish McConnell 1 0-0 3, Ace Gerding 1 0-0 2, Lucas Lewetag 0 0-0 0. Totals 22 5-8 52.
JUNCTION CITY (49)
Carter Franks 3 2-2 8, Staton Barnes 0 0-0 0, Kaden Shafer 3 0-0 8, Aden McNamar 6 4-5 17, Kaleb Moore 3 1-4 8, Logan Holbrook 0 1-2 1, Dylan Giron 0 0-0 0, Brayden Rauschert 2 3-4 7, Harrison Heidt 0 0-0 0. Totals 17 11-17 49.
Team 1 2 3 4 F Philomath (4-4) 8 21 15 8 52 Junction City (6-2) 10 15 11 13 49
3-Point Goals—Philomath 3 (Sapp 2, McConnell), Junction City 4 (Shafer 2, McNamar, Moore). Fouled Out—McConnell. Total Fouls—Philomath 19, Junction City 14. Technicals—None.