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

Area roundup: Lia Galdeira leaving WSU to play in Europe

Lia Galdeira will skip her final season at Washington State to pursue professional basketball opportunities in Europe, the school announced in a press release on Friday.

The 5-foot-11 guard has signed a contract with an agent and plans to play this fall.

Galdeira led the Cougars to their second consecutive postseason appearance last season. She averaged 20 points per game, second in the Pac-12 and 25th nationally. She led the Pac-12 in steals with 105.

She finished second in career scoring after three seasons at WSU with 1,710 points and was a three-time All-Pac-12 player.

“She has had a record-setting and great career as a member of the Cougar women’s basketball familly and now feels it is time to take her talents to the next level,” coach June Daugherty. “It has been a pleasure to coach her.”

Golf

Sean Walsh, who will be a senior at Gonzaga in the fall, won the 115th annual North & South Amateur Championship on the Pinehurst No. 2 course in North Carolina.

He defeated George Cunningham, top-seeded in the 16-player match-play bracket, 3 and 1. Cunningham was a second-team All-Pac-12 player as a freshman last season. Walsh, from Keller, Texas, was an honorable mention All-West Coast Conference selection his junior year.

Walsh was the sixth seed after stroke play cut the field from 96 golfers, shooting a three-round total of 8-over 218 to tie for fifth, six strokes back of medalist Cunningham.

Walsh never trailed in the championship match and was even-par when it ended after 17 holes.

The North and South is the longest running U.S. amateur tournament. Past winners include Jack Nicklaus, Curtis Strange and Davis Love III.

Part of Walsh’s reward for his victory is to have his name emblazoned in bronze on Pinehurst’s Perpetual Wall in the clubhouse along with a lifetime locker in the North & South locker room.

“That’s incredible,” Walsh said in a Pinehurst release. “I didn’t even know I’d have a locker until my host family actually told me. It’s incredible, the names up there. The Jack Nicklauses … just all the guys. It’s something I haven’t been able to be a part of before and to be able to be a part of it, it’s something I don’t even really have words for.”

Walsh competed in the tournament last year but missed the cut.

Hockey

Chiefs forward Kailer Yamamoto of Spokane was been chosen for the U.S. Under-18 Select Team that will compete Aug. 10-15 at the Ivan Hlinka Memorial tournament in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.

The 17-year-old Mead High School student scored 23 goals and had 34 assists for the Chiefs last season and was the WHL Western Conference Rookie of the Year.

The tournament, which began in 1991, will also include teams from Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.