Jess Brown

Spokane Chiefs coach Don Nachbaur said it himself – somebody has to take the bull by the horns.

The Spokane Chiefs may already know who they will face in the first round of the Western Hockey League playoffs, but there is still unfinished business to tend to. The Chiefs, who are locked into a best-of-7, first-round playoff series with the Vancouver Giants, have seven games remaining. They’ll host the Kelowna Rockets tonight in the first of five remaining home games, three of which they will play this week.

The Spokane Chiefs may already know who they will face in the first round of the Western Hockey League playoffs, but there is still unfinished business to tend to.

There’s the unavoidable hype of bringing guys into the Arena Football League that have “NFL experience.”

Following the Gonzaga University women’s basketball team’s eighth straight West Coast Conference title victory, the individual accolades started flowing in. Kayla Standish, Katelan Redmon, Haiden Palmer and Sunny Greinacher were honored Tuesday as the WCC announced its all-WCC teams and individual award winners, voted on by the conference’s nine head coaches.

Following the Gonzaga University women’s basketball team’s eighth straight West Coast Conference title victory, the individual accolades started flowing in.

Last month, the Spokane Chiefs tied a franchise record for wins in January and proved they could beat the best teams in the Western Hockey League. As far as head coach Don Nachbaur is concerned, Spokane is on the other side of that coin after the Chiefs dropped their second consecutive game on Saturday night, following up Friday’s five-goal loss to the Portland Winterhawks with a 7-3 loss to the Tri-City Americans in front of a sold-out crowd of 10,367 at the Arena.

Sharing just wasn’t something Katelan Redmon was prepared to do. Make no mistake, though – Redmon and the Bulldogs showed they were more than prepared to compete. It was the final West Coast Conference regular-season contest for the No. 25 Gonzaga women’s basketball team on Saturday afternoon. In fighting for outright ownership of the title they had won for the previous seven years against a team that defeated them by 30 points earlier this month, the Bulldogs scored a 77-60 win over Brigham Young to capture their eighth consecutive WCC championship in front of a sold-out crowd of 6,000 at the McCarthey Athletic Center.

Sharing just wasn’t something Katelan Redmon was prepared to do. Make no mistake, though – Redmon and the Bulldogs showed they were more than prepared to compete.

Kent Leiss was pleased to see his team in the zone on Friday night. More important, Leiss’ Coeur d’Alene boys basketball team found a way around the Lake City zone defense and built a steady lead down the stretch as the Vikings beat the visiting Timberwolves 68-58 in an Idaho 5A Region I game.

Dominik Uher crossed a large pond to further his deftness on a frozen one. The dynamic 19-year-old Spokane Chiefs center, who hails from the Czech Republic, isn’t the first to do so. Uher follows a lineage of successful European players who came to America looking to raise the stakes in their own brand of game. “You get sad moments, you miss home, but I think every European guy goes through this stuff,” Uher said. “But we pick hockey, and the best hockey is in America.”

Erik Meyer knows ups and downs, and this season he’s looking to experience more of the ups while controlling downs for the Spokane Shock.

Almost instantly, Kayla Standish’s eyes welled up with tears.