A Grip on Sports: We all have a little dog in us when it comes to hoping the sun will shine on our favorite team’s fortunes this year

A GRIP ON SPORTS • The dog stares out the sliding-glass door. The sun is shining outside. His little body is warm, what with the heating duct just to his right making the inside of the house toasty. The sun is shining. It has to be nice outside, right? So he lifts his left paw. Scratches at the glass, asking to go out. Over and over again. Twenty times every cloudless January day.

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• And that same twenty times he turns around and wants to come back in. Almost immediately. The other side of that double-pane of glass? It’s not what it seems. Though it’s hard to think he’ll ever stop believing in the paradise he sees outside.  

Good for him. As Andy Dufresne says every time “The Shawshank Redemption” makes an appearance on TBS or somewhere, hope is a good thing. Maybe the best of things.

The little dog may not understand what hope is, but he certainly hopes the next time he scratches at that door, he’ll be able to plop down and sit on the deck for hours on end, the sun and the air and the wind all warm and embracing.

There is a little dog in all of us, isn’t there? At least when it comes to sports.

Yes, I’m looking at you Cougar fans. But also you, Zag nuts. And 12s. And Husky believers. The Eagle and Vandal faithful as well. Even the most-battered of them all, Mariner fans. Well, it’s either them or those who still hold an eternal flame for the once-mighty SuperSonics.

Hope.

At times it doesn’t feel like the best of things, does it? Sometimes it feels as if Red is right. “Hope is a dangerous thing” he told his friend as the prison walls closed in. “Hope can drive a man insane.”

Or it feels as if hope is the only thing because reality bites.

Getting close doesn’t help, does it. Heck in the past few years the Cougars have had 11-win football seasons, made the NCAA men’s basketball tournament, won the Pac-12’s women’s basketball tournament, had soccer teams advance to the sport’s Final Four and held playoff hopes in mid-November after starting the latest football season with eight wins in nine games.

All those success stories seem to have done is make the inevitable defeats or defections or dead ends feel even more debilitating.

Hopeless.

Gonzaga’s two trips to the NCAA men’s basketball title game since 2017? Expectation-raisers. More than likely unachievable expectation-raisers.

The Seahawks winning it all 11 years ago? It was great and all but hasn’t it made every season since feel a little like a failure because, you know, they didn’t win? Or was it the hope of winning back-to-back titles being dashed in such a devastating way that has made it so? Either way, yuck.

How do Washington fans deal with the past 12 months? A year ago their football team was undefeated. Led by a guy who lost games at the same rate as Knute Rockne. Were an hour of football away from another parade through the streets of Seattle. Today? All that’s left is hope. Of a rebuild, not a dynasty.

Hopeless.

Maybe that’s the way to be. Or, as I like to call it, real. It’s hard. But it’s true. Hoping Julio Rodriguez will stop swinging at sliders in the dirt with runners in scoring position is not a strategy. Nor is wishing all 11 relief pitchers signed off the scrap heap this offseason will morph into Mariano Riviera. Nor is praying the latest mid-season over-the-hill veteran will suddenly rediscover his stroke, hit .424 in August and September and, praise be the baseball gods, October, and lead the team to the promised land.

That seems to be Jerry Dipoto’s strategy, sure, but it shouldn’t be yours and mine anymore.

Let’s just face it. The money-driven changes in college athletics, in baseball, heck in every sport, are not good for this region. Even the Northwest’s “haves” have to rely on hope way too much. Isn’t that right Duck fans? You are still hoping Dan Lanning is the right guy, aren’t you?

OK, maybe the dog will wake up tomorrow or the next day or the one after that. Trundle down to the slider. Look outside. See the sun shining. Whine until someone lets him outside. And it will be 62 degrees.

Heck, it happened one January. In 1918. It could happen again.

He’ll sit down. Enjoy the sun on his back and lie there. Revel in it. Maybe howl a little. And then come back inside.

Will the rest of the winter be easier to bear? Or will it be tainted by the memory of that one day? Hope or hopeless. It’s up to him – and you – to decide.

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WSU: The Cougar men have a chance for a Quad 1 win tonight. They play at Santa Clara (8, CBS Sports), whose latest game was an upset of Gonzaga in the Kennel. An upset built around 3-point shooting. Greg Woods examines that win as well as what Washington State needs to do to top the Broncos. … The women’s basketball team is tied for the West Coast Conference lead, with Tara Wallack leading the way. Greg Lee has this story on how the senior has developed leadership skills. … Jimmy Rogers is not just using the transfer portal to rebuild the football roster. WSU’s new coach is also recruiting high school players to help the process. Greg delves into those signees in this story. … Former Washington State standout, and Memphis Grizzly rookie, Jaylen Wells transferred to Pullman from Division II Sonoma State in Northern California. That probably won’t happen again. The school announced Wednesday it is dropping athletics due to a $24-million school-wide deficit. Or, as they call it in the SEC, a week’s spending on NIL. … Elsewhere in the (current, old and future) Pac-12 and the nation, Jon Wilner identifies five West Coast football coaches who will enter the 2025 season on a hot seat of varying degrees. … Yes, college football is different. But much of it is the same. Including the chaos. … So are fans’ questions. … Washington added a Penn State wide receiver through the portal. …If you have Husky questions, Christian Caple has some answers. … Arizona State’s Kenny Dillingham had as good a season as any coach probably could have. And yet he did not win any national coach of the year awards. … The Colorado football family said goodbye to legendary coach Bill McCartney yesterday. … Among the future Pac-12 members in the Mountain West, as each day passes, Colorado State gets that much closer to moving into the Pac-12. … In basketball news, Jeff Metcalfe has his Best of the West women’s basketball rankings in the Mercury News. WSU and Gonzaga are included. … Washington lost to Iowa in Seattle. … The Utah State men bounced back from their first MWC loss by routing visiting Nevada 90-69. … It looked as if San Diego State’s midseason slump would continue, as the Aztecs trailed winless-in-conference Air Force by a point with 4.4 seconds left in overtime. Then Wayne McKinney III saved their season, going coast-to-coast for a game-winning layup at the buzzer. … Colorado State also won at the buzzer, topping visiting Boise State on Jalen Lake’s 3-pointer. The Broncos had rallied from a 17-point deficit. … Former Gonzaga assistant Tommy Lloyd won his 100th game at Arizona this week. He made light of it in a recent text conversation, which leads me to believe he’s pretty happy with where his team is at.  

Gonzaga: After consecutive West Coast Conference losses, there is no way the Bulldogs will stand pat, is there? Nope. But what form will the changes take? Theo Lawson and Jim Meehan discuss that this morning in their first edition of Four Out this year.

EWU: A coaching change can mean some players lose playing time. But others get a new chance to show what they can do. Sebastian Hartmann has done that at Eastern, as Dan Thompson tells us this morning. The Eagles host Northern Arizona tonight (6, ESPN+). … If Cooper Kupp is going to leave the Rams, Kendrick Bourne knows where he wishes his former Eastern teammate would land. Yes, it with him in New England. … Elsewhere in the Big Sky, Weber State’s 2025 football schedule is complete.

Preps: Yes, we have a roundup of last night’s wrestling action. But we also want to call your attention to Madison McCord’s story about a Gonzaga Prep wrestler, who is a standout in two sports.

Chiefs: Despite its stellar season, Spokane is still looking up to Everett in the WHL standings. But the Chiefs pulled a little closer last night with a 3-2 win at the Spokane Memorial Arena. Dave Nichols was in attendance and has this story.

Youth sports: We can pass along a local briefs column which begins with some soccer tournament results.

Seahawks: Could the Hawks finally have found their offensive coordinator? Or their two offensive coordinators? … The special teams have one hole to fill. … We pass along the Times’ story on free agent linebacker Ernest Jones IV as it ran in the S-R. … What are the best bets among the NFC and AFC title games this weekend? … The Joe Mixon fine story is one of our favorites this week. The NFL is so odd.

Reign: The 2025 schedule is set.

Mariners: The Mike Vorel column in the Times about the lack of unanimity for Ichiro ran in the S-R today. … The voting should be transparent. … Who will be the next Mariner to make the Hall? If they can sign him, I vote for Cal Raleigh. But Rodriguez is probably a better bet. … The M’s have a bunch of prospects in the minor leagues.

Kraken: Alex Ovechkin is coming to town. Sort of like Paul Revere. Well, more like Wayne Gretzky.

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• “The Shawshank Redemption” is one of those movies that never stop giving, is it? If it’s on and you land on it, you watch. Until Red is walking on the beach. Until later …