Roberts Gets National Wrestling Award
University High School graduate Andy Roberts, Spokane’s first three-time State AAA wrestling champion, has been named the Washington state winner of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame Dave Schultz High School Excellence Award.
The annual honor is based equally on wrestling and scholastic achievement and citizenship. Roberts is the first Spokanite to receive the award.
The University of Oregon-bound Roberts had a 3.0 high school grade-point average and compiled a 118-11 record in four years of varsity wrestling for the Titans. In addition to his state titles, he was a three-time regional champion.
At U-Hi, he was nominated for the district superintendent’s award and was a member of his school’s sportsmanship committee.
Basketball
Stanford’s 1997 Naismith winner Kate Starbird will lead the Seattle Reign into the Spokane Arena on Oct. 10 for a women’s professional American Basketball League game against the San Jose Lasers.
Starbird’s former Stanford teammate and U.S. National Team member, Jennifer Azzi, leads the Lasers.
Game time is 7:30 p.m.
Tickets - $7.50, $12 and $15 - are available through G&B Select-A-Seat, by calling 325-SEAT or (800) 325-SEAT or at the Arena box office.
Registration is under way for the Spokane Regional AAU’s 1997-98 season. The league is open to boys and girls teams from 4th through 8th grades. Deadline is Aug. 29.
Info: (509) 838-3440.
College softball
Whitworth College’s first-year softball program has signed three stars from last year’s Community Colleges of Spokane team. Pitchers Traci Moore and Katie Carpenter, and outfielder Marci Meddock will join the Pirates after helping CCS post a 37-9 record.
Moore and Meddock were NWACC North Division All-Stars in 1996. Moore, a Rogers grad, was 9-3 with an ERA of 1.89. She also hit .388 with a team-high two home runs. Meddock, a Mead product, led the Sasquatch in hitting (.468) and hits (58) and was third in RBIs (28). Carpenter had an 8-3 record and 1.59 ERA last season.
Rec softball
Tournament champions have been crowned in the following Spokane County men’s slowpitch divisions: A: Thrifty Scots; B: Country Wide; CC: Bud, Doug and Charley’s; CN: Lawton Printing; CV: Derringer’s; 3D: SRS Roofers; D: Bark Boys-Eastside Saw.
Triathlon
Once again, Spokane’s running nun, Sister Madonna Buder, has qualified for the Ironman World Triathlon Championship.
Buder, 67, qualified for the Oct. 18 event in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, at the Gulf Coast Triathlon in Panama City Beach, Fla.
Miscellany
Bill Gaskins, an NCAA Division I football and track official from Pullman, was elected chairman of the National Association of Sports Officials last week at the group’s meeting in Keystone, Colo.
Gaskins, 53, a former two-sport standout at Lewis and Clark High School and Washington State University who played professionally for the Calgary Stampeders of the CFL, has been officiating since 1972.
“This is a very exciting opportunity and truly an honor,” said Gaskins in a release. “… I look forward to supporting the association’s efforts to recognize the important role sports officials play in our games today.”
Gaskins, who has served on the NASO board since 1994, is director of pharmacy at Pullman Memorial Hospital and an instructor in clinical pharmacy at WSU.
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