John Blanchette

Game long over, a Gonzaga operative pushed a wheelchair through a ground-level corridor at the McCarthey Athletic Center and toward the court, where he encountered Randy Bennett – more resigned than cranky – walking off. “I hope that isn’t for me,” the Saint Mary’s coach cracked.

Steal, pass, layup. It can still be that elementary. In the deciding moments of Gonzaga’s 69-58 women’s basketball victory over San Diego on Saturday, it happened twice in the space of maybe 30 seconds – guard Taelor Karr picking the pocket of the Toreros’ Amy Kame, and then locating a teammate flashing down court. Not unlike a ratty security blanket fetched from a closet shelf, because of these easy points the Zags would be less vulnerable at the finish to whatever long 3s USD might wing in late, or even their own frailties.

PULLMAN – A defender overcommitted high above the key and suddenly a lane to the hoop as wide as the Brisbane River opened up for Brock Motum. Almost as spectacular as the soaring, left-handed jam that ensued was the scream that punctuated it – almost unnerving coming from a relative basketball stoic.

PULLMAN – A defender overcommitted high above the key and suddenly a lane to the hoop as wide as the Brisbane River opened up for Brock Motum.

If you dialed up last weekend’s Saint Mary’s-Brigham Young basketball game to gauge what Gonzaga’s up against in the West Coast Conference’s ménage of the Id, Ego and Super-ego – and you may assign those roles yourself – perhaps you noticed that things were a little, well, uncollegial.

Mike Leach signs his first class of recruits today as football coach at Washington State and it’s ranked … 12th. In the Pac-12.

Mike Leach signs his first class of recruits today as football coach at Washington State and it’s ranked … 12th.

MOSCOW, Idaho – Seems as if the old Idaho box step is back in style. Up, sideways, back.

Ruslan Provodnikov is a boxer who looks to be going places. Freddie Roach and Eric Brown are newly in charge of getting him there with his head attached.

MOSCOW, Idaho – The first step in settling into a shooter’s rhythm? Well, it helps when you get the ball.

MOSCOW, Idaho – The first step in settling into a shooter’s rhythm?

Papering the walls of the subterranean Howard Street Boxing Club are the usual posters from bouts and cards going back decades, and they suggest the musty odor of smoke and beer from arenas and armories long razed.

It was a galoshes kind of day and a sneakers-in- a-snowdrift kind of night at Gonzaga’s McCarthey Athletic Center – not for basketball aesthetes, perhaps, but not to be thrown back, either.

As we wait for the Prince to pick his city, it looks more and more as if the Seattle Mariners will again leave their constituency in a rage – or resigned – that ownership refuses to marshal the resources to field a contender.

Someone out there in the mediaverse had a great analogy the other day as to why anybody humbugging the rematch of LSU and Alabama tonight has it all wrong, and I certainly wish I could remember what it was. But trust me. It was a real pip.

Students are not even close to being back yet – a quirk of the calendar has second semester at Gonzaga starting in March this year – so it doesn’t seem as if the West Coast Conference basketball season has even made the turn at the clubhouse. Still, three conference games are in the books for the Bulldogs and the point spreads so far: 39, 28, 22.

His commute to the gym is 24 miles longer now and takes him close by his old one, a daily reminder of the plunge he’s taken. “I went from fresh water,” Jim Hayford allowed, “into salt water. It’s just a different world.”

All but the last three points of what once was a double-digit lead had been planed away, and time was ticking away on what was shaping up to be another empty possession. This was a tipping point – in the game, maybe in the season for Washington State.