Sports

A handful of trails will close next month at Riverside State Park while crews clear timber on the west side of the Spokane River north of Seven Mile Road. 

Because he’s an affable, down-to-earth product of small-town western Washington, Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd might appear miscast as an easygoing guy in the fiery world of high-level college basketball.

Former Gonzaga coach Kelly Graves has coached a Final Four and four Elite Eight teams, and a potential NCAA champion whose shot was taken away by the pandemic. But to many in women’s college basketball, Graves is Bracket Killer Kelly.

Difference makers

SEATTLE – When the Seattle Seahawks announced earlier this week that outside linebacker/rush end Uchenna Nwosu was changing his jersey number to 7 to accommodate new receiver Cooper Kupp’s desire to keep his No. 10, it indicated that Nwosu was still in the team’s plans for 2025.

The rest of the Mariners' starting pitchers are starting to rub off on Emerson Hancock, and that's an encouraging development on multiple fronts. There has always been a seriousness about Hancock, a 25-year-old right-hander who has generally taken a head-down, be-seen-but-not-heard approach to try to prove himself as a big-leaguer the past couple years. 

It required all of five minutes to determine who the superior Bulldogs were at Intrust Bank Arena. Gonzaga scored 27 of the first 30 points, established a 25-point lead in the first half and steamrolled its SEC opponent for an 89-68 victory.

SEATTLE – What was viewed as the last domino before the NBA would seriously entertain expansion has fallen.

The senior guard from Seattle knocked down five 3-pointers and scored 18 points to guide eighth-seeded Gonzaga past No. 9 Georgia 89-68 Thursday in the opening round of the NCAA Tournament.

WICHITA, Kan. – Here are three observations from Gonzaga’s 89-68 win over Georgia on Thursday in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

A GRIP ON SPORTS • My favorite season is really here. No, not spring, but that’s my favorite calendar season, just edging summer. Talking about NCAA tourney season. One and done. For everyone. Except one. Who will that be? A school with a deep connection to this region. Of course.

Fly fishing

All my friends are drinking, shopping and running too much. Some of them are meditating too much. Others are dating, reading, sleeping too much. I hear that half the population is resting better somehow, but I have yet to feel their calm presence penetrate the ennui that has descended upon many in my world.

Federal officials will conduct a series of prescribed burns this spring at Turnbull National Wildlife Refuge.

Wildlife officials are getting closer to making a final decision on permanent rules for limiting the spread of chronic wasting disease in Washington, including proposed statewide bans on feeding wildlife and using bait to hunt deer, elk and moose.

PULLMAN – In a back room at the Spokane Arena, where Washington State freshman guard Tomas Thrastarson enjoyed a career-best scoring outing in late December, his head coach and teammates couldn’t stop raving about him.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Sometimes a March Madness selection committee can seem daft, and sometimes it can seem shadowy, and sometimes, to a certain type of fan prone to foaming at the mouth, it can seem satanic. Yet all the while there remain those times when it seems a bunch of puckish pranksters who shovel certain teams into a certain corner of the draw and then start giggling.

SEATTLE – Tina Langley has spent four seasons stacking bricks.