Blinn to play in China
Savannah Blinn, a senior-to-be at Gonzaga University, knows what her summer vacation will entail. She’ll be heading to China in mid-June for 10 days to play some volleyball.
Blinn, from Lewiston, has been named to the U.S. Collegiate National Team that will play three matches in Changxing City from June 17-21 – one is expected to be against the Chinese Women’s Junior National team – and two matches in Beijing from June 21-26, one against the Chinese Women’s U-23 National Team.
“Making the Collegiate National team has been something I have always dreamed about,” Blinn said in the release announcing her selection. “This solidifies all the hard work I have put it in over the years, and I am truly blessed for this amazing opportunity!”
An outside hitter for Gonzaga, Blinn will be an opposite hitter for the CNT team in China. She is the only player from the West Coast Conference selected following the U.S. Women’s National Team open tryouts Feb. 20-22 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Only 60 of the more than 230 who participated in the tryouts were selected for various teams and national camps.
“We’re all proud of Savannah and the work she’s done,” said GU volleyball coach Dave Gantt. “She’s very deserving of the opportunity.”
College scene
Kelsey Moos, an Arizona State sophomore from Reardan; Nakia Arquette, a Utah sophomore from Lewis and Clark; and Jamie Weisner, an Oregon State junior from Clarkston, were named to Pac-12 Conference women’s basketball All-Academic teams.
Moos, who has a 3.87 grade-point average in communications, was a first-team selection. Arquette and Weisner, a repeater, were given honorable mention.
• Isaac Griffith, a junior from Lewis and Clark, and Sofia Marikis, a sophomore from Lakeside of Nine Mile Falls, won 10,000-meter events for Western Washington at the Club Northwest Spring Break Open track and field meet last weekend in Seattle.
Griffith led a 1-2-3 Vikings sweep in the men’s 10,000 with a winning time of 31 minutes, 1.37 seconds. Marikis won the women’s event in 38:56.70 as the Vikings went 1-2.
• Emily Stewart, a freshman from North Central, rows in the No. 4 seat on the Santa Clara women’s varsity 8 that finished second in the third final of the Cal Cup at the 42nd San Diego Crew Classic last weekend on Mission Bay after winning the Davis Invitational earlier in March.
Shooting
Amanda Furrer and Eric Uptagrafft, a pair of shooters with Spokane connections, are two of nine former U.S. Olympians who qualified for two May World Cup events during the USA Shooting Spring Smallbore (.22 caliber) Selection Match that wound up Friday in Fort Benning, Georgia.
Furrer, a Mead High School graduate who shot in the 2012 London Olympics, turned in the third-highest qualifying score on Friday to vault from fifth into a second-place finish in women’s three-position rifle. It was the tightest of the six disciplines that were contested.
Uptagrafft, a University High School graduate who also shot in the London Games and has been ranked as high as No. 2 in the world in his event, placed third in prone rifle. He now lives in Phenix City, Alabama, with wife Sandra, also a former Olympian, who won women’s sport pistol.