Ally Tow (SHHS 2018) led the Linn-Benton Community College volleyball team to the Northwest Athletic Conference Championship Tournament in Tacoma last week, but the Roadrunners were eliminated after going 1-2 in the 16-team tournament.
Tow, a sophomore, led the Roadrunners with 11 kills and 12 digs in a 2-1 (25-23, 20-25, 12-15) loss to South Region foe Rogue Community College 2-1 in the elimination bracket on Friday, Nov. 22.
LBCC finished the season 28-12 overall, 13-3 in conference play.
The Roadrunners dropped their first match Thursday to Edmonds 3-2, but rebounded later in the day to beat Walla Walla 2-0 to remain alive in the tournament.
Spokane Community College won the tournament with for the second year in a row.
Tow was named to the NWAC South Region’s all-conference First Team. She was seventh in the statistical standings for the entire conference this season, finishing with 382 kills in 30 matches for a .246 kill percentage. She also recorded 343 digs and led the conference with service aces, with 56.
Junior Sydney Nichol placed 52nd for Corban University in the NAIA National Championships cross-country race Friday, Nov. 22, at at Fort Vancouver in Vancouver, Wash.
It was the third trip to the nationals for Nichol, a 2017 graduate of East Linn Christian Academy.
She finished 11th in the Cascade Collegiate Conference Championships in Cottage Grove on Nov. 8, clocking 18:20.3 on the 5K course, her best time of the year.
Kobe Olson (SHHS 2017), a sophomore at Umpqua Community College, wrestled Sunday, Nov. 24, at the Spokane Collegiate Open, which featured most of the college wrestling programs in the Northwest.
Olson won an 11-0 major decision over Southern Oregon’s Alexander Rendon at 141 pounds, before losing (for the second time this season) to Eastern Oregon’s Blake McNall (fall, 2:53), then falling by a 20-5 technical fall in the consolation bracket to Northern Idaho’s Larry Johnson.
Marissa Kurtz (SHHS 2019), a freshman wrestling for Southern Oregon, finished fourth for Southern Oregon at 116 pounds Nov. 10 at the Mike Clock Open at Pacific University, losing the third-place match to teammate Carol Johnson of Salinas, Calif., a sophomore.
Kurtz also finished sixth at the Spokane Collegiate Open tournament Sunday, Nov. 24, at which the Raiders won the team title over Providence of Montana. She also wrestled, at 130 pounds, for SOU at Eastern Oregon on the way to Spokane Friday, Nov. 22, 7-1 to EOU’s Cassidy O’Hara.
Lane Men’s Cross Country won their third straight Southern Region Cross Country Championship out scoring runner-up Clark by a wide margin (23-75). Tanner Sayers, who ran for Sweet Home through his junior cross-country season before his family moved to Medford, but who can be spotted running through town during the summer, was fifth for the Titans, in 26:16.3, behind teammate Daniel Beckstead, who finished second overall. The Titans had seven of the top 10 finishers.
He did not run for the Titans at the Northwest Athletic Conference championships Nov. 18 at St. Martin’s University in Lacey, Wash. The Titan men finished with five runners in the top 12 – all five of their scorers in the top seven – to take second in their championship race, while the women won their first conference title since 2005.
Tyler Cowger (SHHS 2013) is the new head wrestling coach at Phoenix High School. Previously, he was an assistant wrestling coach at Southern Oregon University, where he was a four-time All-American for the Raiders.
Keegan Holly (SHHS 2018), a sophomore wide receiver for Lewis and Clark, did not have a catch this season.
The Pioneers are getting better. They opened their Northwest Conference season with their first win against Pacific Lutheran since 2011 and second since 1989, and finished 3-4 after beating Puget Sound 33-21 Saturday, Nov. 16, to finish 4-5 overall. Since 2013, Lewis and Clark had not beaten anyone other than Willamette.
Both Lucia Davis and Lauren Yon are swimming at Boise State.
Davis, a junior who graduated in 2017 from East Linn Christian Academy, was third in the 1,000-yard Freestyle (10:48.08) behind teammate Hayley Hill, as the Broncos took three of the top four places in that event, though they lost to Nevada in Reno 187-113 Nov. 2.
Against Idaho in the opening weekend of the 2019-20 season, Yon (SHHS 2018) and her Broncos sophomore relay teammates won the 200-yard medley relay in 1:47.23, in a sweep of the top three spots by Boise State, ahead of the freshmen team (1:47.43) and the seniors (1:47.54). Yon transferred to Boise State this year after Oregon State University abruptly dropped its women’s swimming program.
At their last meet before a break that will run into January, at the 10-team Mizzou Invite, Davis was one of the top performers for the Broncos on the opening day, Nov. 20, placing eighth in the 500-meter Freestyle, in 4:53.61. On Thursday, Davis swam in the 800-Yard Freestyle Relay with the Broncos’ B Team, which placed 12th in 7:38.43, 15 seconds behind the A Team, which was fourth.