Eastern Adams County's Only Independent Voice Since 1887
Eastern Adams County's Only Independent Voice Since 1887
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Around about this time of the football season many teams have a bye or are coming off a bye week. The long 11-12 game seasons call for a break to heal up and catch your breath. This also allows coaching staffs to go on the road and recruit high school and Junior College athletes in order to fill vacancies in next year’s roster. Kids graduate or injuries will knock out a quality athlete but the position needs a replacement National signing day has become a big deal where a 4-5...
I have a few things to talk about after this past weekend. First off, I went to Cheney on Saturday and watched a highly entertaining game between EWU and Idaho. A few years ago when Idaho came back to the Big Sky Conference the powers that be made Idaho and Montana yearly foes because of a suspected rivalry. EWU and Montana had a great rivalry going but the Big Sky said no you get to play Montana State and Portland State each year. Now Idaho has a really good team. Fans in...
I certainly hope you had a great weekend, especially if your favorite college team won on Saturday. Since it is finally fall with a chill in the air it does feel like football weather. For a recap of the games on Saturday that involved what we consider local teams: Washington State defeated Oregon State in the Pac 2 championship game on national TV; Idaho stopped a very good Sacramento State team in its tracks; Washington dominated California and Eastern Washington beat Cal...
The Eastern Washington Eagles were back in Cheney last Saturday defending the Red at Roos Field. At 0-2 I’m sure most people wondered how good this year’s team was. When a difficult schedule is put together with a couple of road games we all hope for an upset to get us feeling good about the next version of Eagle football. EWU opened up in Minnesota where the NFL Vikings call home versus the perennial FCS top tiered North Dakota State Bison. The Eagles would fall 35-10 but...
We are a couple of weeks into the football and volleyball season and fans can start to see where the experienced teams are and where those that maybe rebuilding will eventually end up. For those rebuilding it is a long road and finding the talent and willingness to make that journey means commitment by young athletes that want to be successful. There is something else that happens this time of year that also takes commitment and time constraints. That would be the late season...
This time of year before the first football game is played, it is important to scrimmage or if available get in a jamboree against other teams. Last Saturday at Jimmie Snider Field in Ritzville, the annual high school football jamboree was held on a beautiful, warm sunny afternoon. Most football fans look forward to this day to see the progress made in the first two weeks of practice and because it’s football. One of the things most people did not notice was that there was a...
I’m going to take a week off talking about sports in one manner or another. At our last museum meeting our group suggested that I write about a project that I have been working on at the antique equipment lot near the Depot Museum. In June when Jeff Duval and I had finished the wagon next to the header box on Railroad Avenue we were putting our tools away and cleaning up when some guy comes up and starts ranting about this old piece of equipment that needed to be saved because...
On Halloween day in 1992 my brother Larry and I went to the UW-Stanford football game in Seattle. I could get complimentary tickets as a coach and let’s just say that Larry was my assistant coach for a day Anyway the plan was to park in Bellevue at a Park and Ride and get on the bus to go to Husky Stadium. After we got off the bus and were walking to the Will Call ticket booth we couldn’t help but notice just how much purple surrounded us. If Barney the dinosaur would have got...
There is a line in the song ‘Cats in the Cradle’, a Harry Chapin song from 1974, that said, “My son turned ten just the other day, he said thanks for the ball dad come on let’s play. Can you teach me to throw, I said not today I’ve got a lot to do, he said that’s okay…” It was certainly a sad statement but like most all of Chapin’s songs a real story being told. I’ve often thought about the words turned ten… and can you teach me to throw… and my first thoughts were, ‘You hav...
I’m sure that most Mariner fans have heard about the injury to Jarred Kelenic this past week. In a game against the Minnesota Twins Kelenic was at bat late in the game with runners in scoring position. Kelenic had a great at bat against the Twins fireball throwing reliever fouling off several pitches. But eventually Kelenic struck out. Jarred felt like he let his team down and his emotions got the better of him and in the dugout he took his emotions out by kicking a G...
We have all seen athletes over the years that where exceptional. They put in the extra time in the off season, stayed in shape and were really good all-around players contributing to a team’s success. For so many of these athletes their local fan base is wondering if they have the chance to play at the next level. There was a time when Community Colleges around the state had football programs where a tweener athlete could develop their talent and move on to a four year c...
I watched some of the Major League baseball draft live from Lumen Field in Seattle on Sunday. It was interesting to see how many high school seniors were drafted. I’m sure that a fair amount of them will turn pro and learn more about playing baseball for a living and polish up their game at spring training facilities or at the Class A level around the country. There will be some who will begin their college careers in hopes of learning from some great coaches and facilities i...
There were a couple of baseball games played last week that were significant because of the amount of runs scored by one of the teams. In the Major Leagues, the Los Angeles Angels unloaded on the Colorado Rockies in Denver, 25-1, with a barrage of home runs. Certainly, a laugher if you are an Angels fan. If Colorado is your team and you only get to see one game a year and this was it, then it couldn’t have been a lot of fun for the price of admission. I remember several y...
I met Kenny G several years ago at the Big Sky Track championship in Cheney through a mutual friend. Throughout the day, we conversed about Eastern Washington University football and his time there in the early 1960s. We became fast friends, as they say, and have watched a lot of Eagle games together. Ken told a bunch of stories about his high school days in Othello. Since I told him I was from Ritzville, he had to tell me the story of his prowess as a middle linebacker and...
Hopefully, some of you will remember some of the issues college and professional sports had with gamblers and gambling in general. There was the college basketball point shaving scandal of the 1950s, Paul Hornung’s one year suspension from the NFL for gambling, Pete Rose’s banishment for life from Major League baseball for gambling on baseball while managing a Major League team. Of course the biggest baseball gambling debacle was the Chicago ‘Black Sox’ scandal that banned...
We all get asked about sports. Can you compare this guy’s game from a bunch of years ago with this youngster’s game? So, if you go back 50-plus years, you would see there wasn’t much weight work. But then, there weren’t that many state tournaments either. With some sports not having any playoffs, a team’s only claim to fame was to win the league championship. It wasn’t until Title IX came into effect in 1973 that state championship competition expanded in the state. We a...
Each school year comes to a close with graduation. The following week, juniors are finally considered seniors, even though technically they will need to wait until school starts at the end of August to make it official. For parents, the emotions they have depends on which child is graduating. For some, their first child is receiving the diploma, while for others it may be their last child. Of course, for others it may be the second or third child. I happened to be the fifth...
As I was subbing at the school last week I overheard a conversation concerning the NBA playoffs. The young lads were talking about who they thought was the guy they would have playing on their team. Of course the names are relatable such as LeBron James, Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and several others. It mostly comes down to what team an individual likes and the best player from that team is usually the favorite. I didn't speak up and reveal my true age. I just thought about...
In a month from now school will be out and the Lind Combine Derby weekend will bring a bunch of crash test dummies to town. We still have some spring sports to follow before the final state contests take place on Memorial Day weekend. Unfortunately the LRS baseball team was eliminated this past Thursday. The team had a so-so season but this group of seniors have had a pretty good year with a successful football season and a berth at state for the basketball team with a 5th...
Last week I talked about some of the changes that were made to the game of baseball in order to speed it up a bit. But I left out a couple of big changes that really need to be mentioned. One of the changes concerns the pitcher when there is a runner on base, mostly first base. The pitcher is now limited to make two throws over to first to keep the runner close especially if he is a base stealer. Now the pitcher can throw over a third time but he needs the first baseman to...
My how things have changed in just a couple of short years, or has it been three. Baseball is a different game since March 16, 2020 when spring training was suspended and the Major and Minor Leagues were put on hold. We would go through a shortened 60 game schedule that started in July without fans and even the announcers didn’t go to the away games. Major League baseball needed to make a few changes to shorten the game and one of those rule changes was for any extra inning g...
The basketball tournaments are over and we local fans should be happy that our teams played on for a while. Getting to playoff time is always fun. We get to brag about our team and watch them play in different venues against new opponents. The Broncos had a great year and their late season rally and defensive prowess was something to be proud of. I know a lot of fans love to watch the up and down the court pressing and fast breaks but late in the season that isn’t easy to d...
I think it is really interesting to see how many Gonzaga Bulldog basketball fans are out there. I mean fans that had no idea that the school existed until the tournament runs the last 24 years. Since I had two older siblings that attended the school I knew a lot about it and I also know that John Stockton went there and that Dan Fitzgerald preceded Dan Monson who preceded Mark Few as the head coach for the beloved Zags. A majority of the Gonzaga fans today only know about Few...
I have had the good fortune to be able to attend several Hall of Fame inductions in the last 20 years. The first was for one of my high school basketball coaches; one for a friend that was of a member great Jr. College football team and last Saturday night when Virg McCrady was inducted into the Spokane Basketball Officials’ Hall of Fame. As a former player; as a coach and as a guy that runs the shot clock at Bronco home games it was a bit interesting to see all of the r...
So we are down to our final two weeks of college basketball. I’m kind of a basketball junky. I love the high school playoffs and tournaments followed by the college conference tournaments and then of course March Madness. While many people will follow their team and could care less about watching any other team I love to watch the different teams, players and coaching styles. I’m not sure why but I can be watching a game and immediately start wanting one of the teams to win. I...