Vandals, Cougars Turn In Strong Performances

Ian Waltz and Randi Smith were double winners for Washington State and two women athletes broke or set school records for the Cougars at the McDonald’s I Indoor Track & Field Meet in Moscow.

Agneta Rosenblad equaled her school-record time in the 55-meter hurdles (7.89) and Jeannette Martus bettered her WSU record in the pole vault, going 12 feet, 1-1/2 inches.

Waltz, a senior All-American from Post Falls, won the men’s discus with a personal-best indoor mark of 194 feet and took the shot put title with a season-best distance of 62-1/4.

Smith won the women’s 200 and 400 races in career-best times of 24.71 seconds and 55.50.

Janet Collar, an assistant coach at Community Colleges of Spokane, won the women’s mile and 3,000-meter races.

Idaho junior Katja Schreiber’s throw of 158 feet, 2 inches bettered the previous UI mark of 148-0 by Jill Wimer in 1996. Still, Schreiber’s throw wasn’t quite long enough to beat Washington State’s Mandy Borshowa, who won the event with a throw of 165-2.

The Vandals men’s team was led by Joachim Olsen, already a NCAA qualifier, who finished second in the shot put with an NCAA provisional qualifying throw of 60-11.

Wrestling

As usual, Ricks and North Idaho College dominated the NJCAA Region 18 wrestling tournament, this time with Ricks coming out ahead.

The two teams had the winner in every weight class but two Saturday at Coos Bay, Ore., with Ricks taking the team championship with 114 points. NIC was second with 111.5 points.

Still, North Idaho qualified all 10 of its wrestlers for the national tournament. Cardinals coach Pat Whitcomb was certainly pleased with the significant accomplishment.

“I feel pretty good qualifying 10 guys, that’s what you need going to nationals,” Whitcomb said. “Heck, I’d settle for fifth if we qualified 10 guys.”

North Idaho won three divisions. Nathan DeLeon won at 125 pounds, Ry Stone at 184 and David Sandberg at 197.

The top three in each weight class qualified for nationals. Placing second or third for NIC were Ravil Mukhamediyev (third at 141), Andy Roberts (second at 149), Trevor Floerchinger (second at 157), Travis Liermann (second at 165) and Alain Djoumessi (second at 285).

Also, North Idaho’s Kelly Krepps received a wild-card qualification after finishing fourth in the 174-pound class.

The name of NIC’s 10th qualifier was not available.

Baseball

Kansas State outfielder Kasey Weishaar was 3for4 at the plate and drove in four runs to lead the Wildcats to a 9-7 victory over Washington State in second-round play of the Spalding Baseball Fiesta.

KSU (2-0) built an early 8-0 lead before the Cougars (1-2) forged an eight-run comeback over the last four innings in front of 645 spectators at Albuquerque Sports Stadium.

With WSU down 8-0 after five innings, Cougars designated hitter Mike Knight started a rally in the sixth with a leadoff triple to deep center field. Sophomore Evan Hecker knocked him home with a groundout to second base to put WSU on the board. Senior Ray Hattenburg plated two runs on a two-out double off the right-field fence to pull WSU to 8-3. Two doubles scored three more runs in the seventh, then the Cougars scored once more in the eighth but left the tying run on base.

Swimming

Oregon State defeated Washington State 118-85 in a women’s dual swim meet at Pullman, giving the Beavers a weekend sweep of the Cougars.

The Cougars and Beavers first began their twomeet tradition in 1993. Oregon State defeated WSU 140-121 Friday night.

Erin Eldridge clocked 2:18.16 in the 200 breaststroke and Kelley Miedema finished in 2:06.29 in the 200 backstroke for Washington State. Freshman Melissa Hubley turned in a time of 2:05.87, good for first place in the 200 butterfly.

Whitworth’s men and Puget Sound’s women were the winners in a meet at Whitworth.

Ben Swinehart was a triple winner for the Pirates’ men’s team as Whitworth won 104-95.

Swinehart won the 500-yard freestyle (4:48.83), 200 IM (1:59.14) and 1,000 freestyle (9:56.60).

Ryan Freeman and Brian Rice each won an individual event to go with a leg on the winning 200 freestyle relay for Whitworth. Freeman won the 100 backstroke (53.90) and Rice the 100 freestyle (48.72).

Puget Sound’s women defeated Whitworth 127-78. Mindy Galbraith won the 500 freestyle (5:20.40) and 1,000 freestyle (10:55.89) for the Pirates.

Katie King won the 200 freestyle (1:56.74) and 100 freestyle (55.00).