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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Gonzaga’s Ames feels at home

Lauren Ames’ first visit to the Gonzaga University campus came during her junior year in high school. She had ventured from her home in Albuquerque, N.M., to visit relatives still living in Northport, where her ancestors first settled in the early 1990s.

Now, as the starting goalkeeper on GU’s women’s soccer team, she feels right at home – thanks, in part, to the decisions of her cousins, Walt and Steven Ames, to also become Bulldogs.

Walt, who lives in the Seattle area, is a member of Gonzaga’s crew team, while Steven, a Vancouver, Wash., resident, will try to make the Bulldogs’ baseball team as a pitcher.

“We still have family members living in little towns around here,” said Lauren, a sophomore who has started all 14 matches in goal for the Bulldogs (5-7-2, 0-1-0 West Coast Conference) this fall. “So, it’s nice that my cousins and I have all managed to come back to the area to go to college.”

Ames, who remembers falling in love with the GU campus the first time she saw it, is having a splendid year that included a WCC Player-of-the-Week award last week when she turned away seven shots in a 0-0 tie against Idaho State and then made a career-high 12 saves in a 0-0 draw against Weber State.

The two shutouts were among the five she has recorded this year and boosted her career total to seven, which is third on GU’s career list.

As a freshman last fall, Ames shared time in goal, making six starts and posting a goals-against average of 0.43, which was the lowest in the history of the Bulldogs’ program. While that average has risen to 1.18 this year, Ames has established herself as one of the WCC’s top young keepers.

“Obviously, there’s a lot more pressure on me this year,” Ames said. “Fortunately, I’ve got some great defenders playing in front of me, because the West Coast Conference is one of the toughest in the country.”

The Bulldogs, after opening WCC play at home with a 4-0 loss to No. 3-ranked Portland on Sunday, will host Pepperdine at noon Friday and Loyola Marymount at 1 p.m. Sunday.

Cougs show good signs

It wasn’t the most productive of road trips for Washington State last weekend, but Cougars coach Matt Potter certainly wasn’t complaining about the way his team played in opening Pacific-10 Conference play against national powers UCLA and USC.

The Cougs (6-3-4, 0-1-1), who went in rated 25th, took No. 3-ranked and unbeaten UCLA (11-0-2, 2-0-0) into a second overtime Friday before losing 2-1 and then bounced back Sunday to earn a 0-0 tie against fifth-ranked USC (11-1-1, 1-0-1) despite being outshot 9-0 in the first 18 minutes.

“It was incredible to watch the numbers USC was able to get in the first half, and we were fortunate to be 0-0 at halftime,” Potter said. “We were able to adjust our tactics and played much better in the second half and overtime.”

Pirates remain ranked

Whitworth University’s men and women remained among the Top 25 NCAA Division III team in the nation in the NSCAA/adidas rankings.

The Pirates men (9-2-1, 5-2 Northwest Conference) slipped from 18th to 22nd after splitting a pair of league road matchups last weekend against Pacific (3-1 loss) and George Fox (3-1 win). The women (8-3-1, 4-3-1) remained at No. 16 after beating Pacific (3-0) and George Fox (3-2).

Corner kicks

With her goal in last Sunday’s 2-1 loss to Weber State, EWU’s Lauryn Koelzer tied Cyeeta Mott’s single-season school record of six, with five regular-season games left to play. … EWU goalkeeper Jessica Blessard continues to lead the Big Sky Conference with a save percentage of .878. She also ranks second in the conference with a goals-against average of 1.01.