Idaho’s Kurrat, Richardson claim titles
Manuela Kurrat and Jereme Richardson gave Idaho a sweep of the multievents titles Thursday at the Big West Conference track and field championships in Irvine, Calif. – Richardson winning the decathlon for the third time and Kurrat breaking a 14-year-old meet record by more than 200 points.
Kurrat cruised to an easy victory in the heptathlon, totaling 5,614 points to beat LaShana Verdon of Cal State Northridge by more than 500 points. En route, Kurrat won five of the seven events, including the concluding pair of the javelin (151 feet, 9 inches) and 800-meter run (2 minutes, 15.02 seconds).
“It’s amazing she can have an off day and still record the second-best mark in the nation,” said Vandals coach Yogi Teevens.
Richardson, who completed a decathlon at Idaho just six days ago, won only one of the final five events – the pole vault, with a leap of 14-71/4 – but still scored 7,059 points, overtaking first-day leader Justin Johnson of Northridge heading into the final event. Idaho teammate Marcus Luckstead moved up to third with a strong second day which included a winning discus throw of 138-9, finishing with 6,498 points.
“I have to give Jereme a lot of credit for battling back,” said UI coach Wayne Phipps. “It was a really tough task to do two decathlons in a row.”
“Eastern Washington’s David Sargent and Matt Ludwigson finished within two points of each other in fifth and sixth place of the decathlon at the Big Sky Conference championships in Flagstaff, Ariz.
Sargent edging his teammate in the final event to total 6,414 points.
Montana’s Andrew Levin broke the meet record with a 7,801 score, which included wins in three final-day events.
Basketball
Slots are still available for the Hoopfest 3-on-3 tournament, which will be held downtown on June 25 and 26.
Hoopfest will continue accepting entries on a space-available basis.
Participants can mail in or drop off entries at the Hoopfest office, 601 West Riverside, Suite 206. Info: 624-2414.
Soccer
The Spokane Shadow will host the Abbotsford Rangers tonight and the Cascade Surge on Saturday night in Premier Development League Northwest Division play at Albi Stadium.
Spokane went 5-0 against the Rangers last season. The Shadow and Cascade both finished 11-4-1 last year.
The Shadow opened the season Saturday with a 2-0 win over the Yakima Reds.
Both weekend matches will start at 7:05. Spokane won’t play at home again until June 4.
Softball
Ashley Boek (16-12) allowed three hits and Aimee Minor had four runs batted in as the University of Washington (30-19, 9-10) posted a six-inning, 9-0 win over sixth-ranked Oregon State (40-12, 13-6) in Pacific-10 Conference play at Husky Softball Stadium.