Sports

Dora Davis’ team of high school basketball players huddled around her in a locker room at the Arena Wednesday as she worked the play chart during halftime.

YAKIMA – Amid the disappointment of a season-ending loss in the State 2A tournament Wednesday at the Yakima Valley SunDome, Rogers boys basketball team could realize just how far it has come.

Midway through the first half Saturday against Northern Colorado, Eastern Washington’s hold on first place in the Big Sky Conference standings looked tenuous.

BILLINGS – Recently announced funding from the Department of the Interior will go to reintroducing bison to Glacier National Park and helping Yellowstone expand its program of bison transfers to tribes.

SAN FRANCISCO – Chris Gerlufsen spent considerable time weighing the pros and cons of leaving San Francisco’s hostile arena on the Hilltop for one of the marquee games on the Dons’ home West Coast Conference calendar.

TACOMA – The Gonzaga Prep Bullpups are one of the youngest teams at the State 4A tournament with just one senior and two juniors on the active roster.

The Gaels, on the other hand, are a lock for March Madness.

The NCAA is a mess, but the College Football Playoff isn't far behind according to a member of the governing board.

SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco’s Jonathan Mogbo has played his way into consideration for West Coast Conference player, newcomer and defender of the year awards.

The intrigue surrounding Thursday’s Gonzaga-San Francisco game – and GU-Saint Mary’s on Saturday for that matter – is the impact the results could have on the West Coast Conference standings, WCC and NCAA tournaments and conference individual awards.

The West Coast Conference regular-season winds down this week with Gonzaga facing San Francisco, which is just behind them in the standings, before a showdown with first-place Saint Mary’s. We reached out to the San Francisco Chronicle’s Steve Kroner for a closer look at the Dons and Gaels.

A GRIP ON SPORTS • It’s not often we receive a Christmas gift that just keeps on giving as the next year rolls on. But we did this Christmas. An electronic gadget that keeps our coffee hot as we write each morning. It works spectacularly. What a time to be alive.

PULLMAN – The play that engineered Washington State’s colossal upset of Arizona last weekend, Jaylen Wells’ four-point play from the corner in crunch time, wasn’t supposed to happen.

He came to Mariners camp especially curious about Seattle's pitching staff, and about one pitcher in particular. Gammons lives in Cape Cod, Mass., and makes a point each summer to attend as many Cape Cod League games as he can. It's one of the premier leagues for college players, and George Kirby pitched in the Cape as a 20-year-old in 2018. 

The Eastern Washington women’s basketball team took care of business last week.

A 0-3 start was hardly ideal for the Garfield-Palouse girls basketball team, and looking back, coach Garrett Parrish might have been happy that his team is just playing in the State 1B tournament this week at the Arena.