Splash earn trip to Jr. Olympics

The Spokane Splash U18 girls volleyball team won the Pacific Northwest Qualifier Open Division gold medal this weekend and earned a trip to the Junior Olympics in Dallas this summer.

The Splash were unbeaten in the tournament and defeated AJV 18 Mizuno of Austin, Texas, in the championship match on Sunday at the Convention Center. Match scores were 25-16, 25-22.

Baseball

Jeffrey Inman scattered eight hits over 71/3 shutout innings with five strikeouts and one walk to give the Stanford Cardinal a 4-1 Pacific-10 Conference baseball victory over the Washington State Cougars Sunday afternoon at Stanford, Calif.

Stanford (12-7, 2-1) scored all its runs in the fourth inning on an RBI double by Sean Ratliff, a bases-loaded base-on-balls to Jake Schlander and a two-run single by Cord Phelps.

Washington State (16-9, 2-4) scored its only run in the top of the ninth inning on a pinch-hit RBI triple by John Desmarais.

•Brett Wilcox was 2 for 3 and drove in three runs to lead the Washington Huskies (17-8, 1-2) to a 6-4 Pacific-10 victory over the Oregon State Beavers (13-8, 2-1).

•Eric Thames homered twice and Nathan Newman and Nick Gaudi combined on a four-hit shutout as the Pepperdine Waves (16-7, 1-0) belatedly opened West Coast Conference play with a 10-0 victory over the Gonzaga Bulldogs (15-11, 0-1) at Patterson Baseball Complex. Inclement weather reduced the scheduled three-game series to a two-game series, with the second game to be played today at noon.

•Willamette University and Whitworth University split a Northwest Conference doubleheader that was played in Kennewick after snowy conditions forced abandonment of Merkel Field on the Whitworth campus.

In the opener, Kyle Stalker had a three-run homer to lead Willamette past Whitworth 9-4. In the nightcap, Dan Belet drove home the winning run in the bottom of the eighth inning and John Hauck pitched two shutout innings in relief to give the Pirates (9-15, 8-10) a 6-5 win over the Bearcats (11-12, 7-7).

The teams will attempt to play a doubleheader today. The site – either on Whitworth’s campus or in Kennewick – will be determined by conditions this morning.

Softball

Erin Guzy’s three-run homer to right field in the top of the seventh inning gave the Oregon State Beavers (22-16, 1-2) a 5-3 Pacific-10 victory over the Washington Huskies (22-10-1, 1-1) at Seattle.

Rowing

The Gonzaga University men’s team claimed two victories at the Pac-10 Challenge on the 2,000-meter Redwood City Lagoon in Redwood City, Calif.

The Varsity 8+ finished in 6 minutes, 39.21 seconds to outdistance UCLA by 11.24 seconds, while the Novice 8+ boat beat Oregon State, finishing in 6:35.84. Oregon State finished in 6:40.13.

Men’s golf

Whitworth finished second at the Northwest Conference Spring Classic played at Quail Valley GC in Banks, Ore. Pacific won the nine-team tournament. Jordan Carter was the top Whitworth golfer with a two-round score of 149, for third place.