FOOTBALL:Early enrollee running back Max
Borghi breaks tackles, turns heads this spring at Washington State
UPDATED: Thu., April 12, 2018,
10:54 p.m.
By Theo Lawson. Spokane S-R
PULLMAN – Andre Dillard is
either trying to pump up his young teammate or send a deflating message to his
defensive counterparts on the other side of the line of scrimmage. He’s
probably accomplishing both.
Whenever Max Borghi cracks a
big run, the soft-spoken, even-tempered Dillard comes to life: “He’s in high
school! He’s in high school!” the Washington State senior left tackle chants.
Dillard’s jabs are coming more
frequently as the Cougars progress through spring camp, which, same as Borghi’s
college football career, turned 10 days old Thursday afternoon at Martin
Stadium.
The way Borghi’s been running,
though, it feels like 10 going on 1,000.
“I think every day from the
start has been a good day for Max Borghi,” WSU coach Mike Leach said.
“That kid’s a freak, just to be
honest with you,” Dillard added.
“I’m glad he’s on our team,
that’s for sure,” redshirt junior quarterback Trey Tinsley said.
“Max, for a freshman coming in,
he’s built for college football already,” running backs coach Eric Mele said.
The true freshman running back
should be tracking down a prom date right now and participating in the
senior-specific activities Pomona (Colorado) High School is offering to its
Class of 2018. Borghi’s friends and classmates at Pomona will be putting on
their graduation caps and gowns on May 17. He’ll have already spent near 50
hours practicing – and many more weight training – with the Pac-12 Cougars.
By then, Borghi may have
already climbed a few rungs up the running back depth chart.
“It’d be tough to kind of beat
those other guys out,” Mele said, “but every day goes by and he’s kind of
closing the gap a little bit.”
“Those other guys” are James
Williams, a shifty, elusive junior who led WSU in total carries last season
(92), and Keith Harrington, a fifth-year senior who has experience as a
starter. Borghi can’t match the experience those two have playing on Saturdays
– Williams and Harrington have combined to make 52 appearances – so he’s
finding other ways to distinguish himself this spring.
“He runs really hard and when
you watch tape, he’s always falling forward,” Tinsley said. “He’s always
getting that extra yard. If it’s a 2-yard loss, he’s getting back to the line
of scrimmage. If he’s getting to the line, he’s got a hole, he’s going.”
Midway through WSU’s 11-on-11
team period on Thursday, he collected a handoff from QB Cammon Cooper, darted
between two blockers and lowered his shoulder into Deion Singleton, knocking
the safety on his back. Borghi wrestled away another tackler, Dylan Axelson,
before finally being pushed out of bounds at the end of a 35-yard gain.
Borghi’s spring highlight reel
is scattered with plays like that.
“He’s a 200-pound kid, but you
look at him, tight waist and he’s rocked up,” Mele said. “He’s thick, he’s
thicker than you expect. You kind of don’t see it in the pads, but he’s got a
low center of gravity, shoulder pads are over his knees, which enables him to
kind of run people over and keep his feet going and kind of always fall
forward, which is a great quality to have.”
Borghi totaled 3,512 rushing
yards and 50 touchdowns in three seasons at Pomona, but what makes him the
quintessential Air Raid running back is his aptitude for catching the football.
To supplement his monster rushing numbers, Borghi also caught 79 passes for
1,113 yards and 10 touchdowns as a high school player. He returned a punt and a
kick for a touchdown during his senior season, and the Cougars have designs on
using him in the game’s third phase this fall.
“We knew if he came, he’d be a
nice fit with our offense because he can catch, too, out of the backfield and
he can do all that stuff,” Williams said. “He can get us to our third year
straight of getting 1,000/1,000 (rushing yards/passing yards), so that’s our
goal again.”
Borghi could be taking carries
away from Williams in September, but the third-year running back is still
making a point to tutor his younger teammate as he proceeds through his debut
spring camp. Granted, Williams admits he hasn’t had to do much.
“He’s picking up everything
faster than I did honestly and he’s getting a lot more reps and he’s really
doing good,” Willams said. “He’s impressing everybody.”
And to think, the kid’s still
in high school.
…………..
Cougs' Trey Tinsley keeps
quarterbacking in Pac-12 family
The fourth-year junior says
it’s important for a QB to show emotion, ala Baker Mayfield
By Dylan Haugh , Cougfan.com
PULLMAN – For Trey Tinsley,
quarterbacking is in his genes. His father, Scott, played college football at
Southern Cal and briefly flirted with the NFL. Tinsley says the two talk every
day after Cougar spring practice.
“He’s had a lot of lessons ... he just wants
to make sure that I don’t miss an opportunity, that I’m working every day,”
Tinsley said. “We talk every day after practice, just about how it went. He’s
always supported me, he’s never really pushed me too hard.”
Does Tinsley get his on-field
moxie from his father? Tinsley says in that regard, he looks more toward a
quarterback he admires, 2017 Heisman Trophy winner Baker Mayfield. Tinsley
touched on why it’s important to have a certain edge at quarterback.
Tinsley also spoke on the
productive the springs that Easop Winston and Max Borghi have put together from
his perspective at QB, and that “I’d be lying” to say he hasn’t thought about
WSU’s 2018 game against USC in Los Angeles.
…………..
BASEBALL WSU baseball looks to
climb out of cellar vs. Cal
WSU may be without Harrer in
home series that starts tonight
By Stephan Wiebe, Moscow Pullman
Daily News staff writer Apr 13, 2018
Coming off its first solo
no-hitter in since 1976, the Washington State baseball team returns to
Bailey-Brayton Field with some positives vibes for a home series against Cal
this weekend.
Senior pitcher Scotty Sunitsch
slung a nine-inning no-hitter Sunday to give the Cougars their biggest win of
the season, 7-0 against Oregon, and help the team avoid a sweep in Eugene.
But the trip wasn’t all good
news for WSU. The Cougars (9-17 overall, 4-8 Pac-12) lost the series 1-2 and
fell to last place in the Pac-12 standings, and they might also be without
their biggest slugger, Justin Harrer, this weekend.
Harrer tweaked his back on a
big swing in Sunday’s game and is questionable to play against the Bears. The
junior left fielder and second baseman leads the Cougars with 15 RBI and six
home runs, none more notable than an extra-innings, walk-off homer against
Arizona State last month.
Washington State coach Marty
Lees said he won’t hesitate to sit Harrer if he wasn’t feeling 100 percent.
“He took a big hack,” Lees said. “He fell
down. It was the hack you’re supposed to taking in the three-hole when it’s
right down the middle.
“He’s a tough kid, he’ll do all he’s supposed
to as far as getting healthy. We just want him healthy.”
Despite the series loss, Lees
said he’s proud of how his team bounced back to avoid the sweep — in
particular, with Sunitsch.
The senior threw only 95
pitches in nine innings, striking out nine batters. After his final strikeout,
teammates rushed the mound to celebrate the no-hitter.
“We broke out on Sunday,” Lees said. “Felt
very good about how our kids bounced back. It was much easier to have the
confidence when you have Scotty Sunitsch throw a no-hitter for the day.”
Another breakout player was the
Cougars’ leadoff man, Andres Alvarez. An honorable mention All-Pac-12 shortstop
a year ago, Alvarez has struggled this season, hitting .228.
The junior garnered two hits,
two runs, an RBI and a walk in Sunday’s win.
“In regards to hitting, Andre
Alvarez had a very good weekend,” Lees said. “He’s been struggling throughout
the season but he had a really good series.”
Catcher Robbie Teel also
stepped up in his second full series back from a knee injury suffered in the
first week of the season. Lees felt comfortable enough with Teel to move him up
from the eight-hole to the six-spot in Sunday’s game, and he delivered with a
three-RBI double in the seventh inning.
Lees said he’s been impressed
with his team’s defense this season and has seen improvement from the pitching
staff in Pac-12 play, but he still needs to see better hitting, especially with
two outs and with runners in scoring position.
The Cougars’ .238 batting
average is worst in the conference.
Meanwhile, Cal comes to town
with a conference-leading .312 average and one of the best hitters in the
Pac-12 in Andrew Vaughn.
The sophomore infielder leads
the Pac-12 in batting average (.446) and RBI (39), is tied for the lead in runs
scored (35) and is second in home runs (14).
Lees said one key to beating
the Bears (19-11, 5-7) will be to limit the batters ahead of Vaughn in the
lineup.
“Maybe one of the best hitters in the whole
country,” Lees said. “It will be nice to keep people off base in front of him
and put him in a position where maybe he’s the only hitter.”
The first pitch is scheduled
for 5 p.m. today at Bailey-Brayton Field and the three-game series continues
through Sunday.
::::::::::::::
WSU passed accreditation
evaluation, commended
Evaluation team made
recommendations for next NWCCU review
By IAN SMAY, Evergreen
The Northwest Commission on
Colleges and Universities gave its evaluation feedback, which included
commendation of the administration’s inclusion and transparency efforts, to end
its on-campus WSU visit Wednesday.
The evaluating team, led by
University of Alaska Fairbanks Provost Susan Henrichs, supplied a list of six
commendations and three recommendations for WSU following the three-day on-site
visit.
WSU President Kirk Schulz and
Provost Dan Bernardo said the evaluation went well.
“This went better than I think
any of us could have hoped for,” Schulz said.
Henrichs spoke on
university-wide commendations, as well as special recognition of the Student
Success Council and the Office of Assessment of Teaching and Learning, to a
crowd of about 40 people.
The evaluation team commended
the administration for transparency, inclusiveness and decision-making,
Henrichs said. The group also praised the ATL’s assessment of student learning
outcomes, especially in relation to UCORE curriculum.
Past evaluations listed the
assessment of student learning outcomes as a recommendation for improvement and
commended the university’s plans to revitalize classrooms, citing the new
SPARK: Academic Innovation Hub as an example.
After listing the team’s
commendations for WSU, Henrichs informed attendees of the three recommendations
the group decided upon. These included separating data to more closely view
issues faced by different parts of the university, creating a fully
comprehensive emergency plan with contingencies and using the results of
university assessments to inform decision-making and resource allocation.
Bernardo said he was happy with
the recommendations made.
“Everybody receives some recommendations,”
Bernardo said. “A couple of those are really insightful and I think really will
be helpful.”
He said the group did not list
those recommendations as major, meaning they are not time-sensitive in order to
maintain accreditation. They instead indicate WSU should look into these
concerns over the next seven-year cycle.
Many universities receive the
emergency-planning recommendation, and the evaluation team mentioned places
like the Vancouver campus, Bernardo said.
“I think they felt we … had
better emergency preparedness on the Pullman campus,” Bernardo said, “and
perhaps needed to work on that a bit on other campuses.”
WSU will keep its accreditation
from the NWCCU as expected, Bernardo said.
“For an institution like us,”
he said, “that really never was in jeopardy.”
::::::::::::::::::::
FOOTBALL
Pelluer grateful to be back
Linebacker was granted a
medical redshirt, which allows him one more season with Cougars
By Dale Grummert, Lewiston Trib
Apr 13, 2018
For a span of a few minutes
during a Washington State football game against Oregon State last September at
Martin Stadium, the only person who knew there was something seriously wrong
with Peyton Pelluer’s left foot was Peyton Pelluer.
Every other Cougar was
unambiguously thrilled with his big play.
With the Beavers trailing 7-2
but mounting a threat in the first quarter, a blitzing Pelluer had made a
diving attempt to sack Jake Luton, who was forced to dump the ball to Seth
Collins for a 1-yard loss, bringing up fourth down on the Cougar 30-yard line.
The Beavers then called a
timeout to discuss their options. So most viewers didn’t notice WSU’s senior
middle linebacker hobble to the sideline, and those who did notice probably
thought he had benignly tweaked an ankle.
But he never returned to the
field. And it wasn’t until the next day that he learned he’d broken a navicular
bone in his foot — that his season and possibly his college career were
history.
Seven months later, though, he
can only be grateful for the way the painful episode played out. If the cards
had fallen a bit differently, he wouldn’t be participating in yet another set
of spring drills this month, in anticipation of yet another football season in
Pullman.
One reason his injury was
inconspicuous (TV cameras, for example, never caught wind of it) was that it
was almost incidental to the play. As doctors have explained it to Pelluer, it
was a wear-and-tear injury that would have reached a breaking point anyway.
They compared it to a paper clip that has been bent repeatedly until it snaps.
It just happened to snap on one
of the more flamboyant plays of Pelluer’s exemplary career.
“I just stood up and tried to take a couple of
steps,” he recalled Thursday after the Cougars’ 10th spring practice. “And it
did not feel right. They (the Beavers) were in a position to punt or call a
timeout. Thankfully they called a timeout. It would not have been comfortable
to play another down. I literally could barely walk. They tried taping me up
during the timeout. It just wasn’t happening. I told (linebackers) coach (Ken)
Wilson, ‘I can’t walk, that well.’ It was weird how it happened.”
If it had happened two weeks
later, yes, his college career would have been done: He was a senior who had
already redshirted. But the incident happened in Game 3 of the season, which
gave him a solid chance of being granted an extra year of eligibility from the
NCAA.
The case stayed in limbo for
longer than usual, but in January he was indeed granted an extra year in what’s
normally a five-year eligibility clock.
In most cases, a player seeking
an extra year needs to have lost at least 30 percent of not one but two seasons
of eligibility because of injury or other matters beyond his control. What may
have complicated Pelluer’s case in the NCAA’s eyes was the fact that his first
debilitating injury happened in his first year on campus, when most players
redshirt anyway.
It was a painful case of turf
toe, sustained early in the 2013 season during one of Wazzu’s weekly Thursday
scrimmages for little-used players. Pelluer hadn’t yet appeared in a real game,
but he had suited up and was listed on the special-teams depth chart, he said.
So he was able to make the case
that the turf toe forced coaches’ hands in deciding to redshirt him. He’s
grateful to the careful documentation of the injury by then-WSU trainer Andy
Mutnan, now at Penn State.
After last season’s injury
against Oregon State, Pelluer made good use of his recovery period. He hails
from a family rife with coaches, and he plans eventually to add to their
number. So he spent the last three months of the year tutoring the young
linebackers who were trying to offset the absence of a 34-game starter. He
spent home games in the press box, listening through a headset to the coaches’
strategizing. He thought better of adding his own remarks, but in any case
learned a lot.
He briefly considered the idea
of moving on with his life at season’s end — dispensing with his plea to the
NCAA and getting ready for a shot at the NFL.
“There was definitely some decision-making,”
he said. “But in my heart I knew if I got this year (of eligibility) I was
going to take it. And from the get-go I was pretty confident I was going to get
it. I went about the healing process, the petition process, believing that I’d
get it. So not a lot changed from the time I learned I was hurt to the time I
got the sixth year.”
Week after week, however, he
received a vivid reminder of the injury.
Why? Because it happened on
such an otherwise sweet play. On the night before every game, coaches included
it in the highlight reel they showed to players for inspiration.
“Literally,” Pelluer said, laughing, “I saw
myself break my foot every week.”
::::::::::::::::
(SEL/Schwietzer Engineering
Laboratories has its headquarters and main plant in Pullman)
Schweitzer Engineering
Laboratories holds annual STEM event for students
By JUSTYNA TOMTAS of the Lewiston
Trib Apr 13, 2018
LEWISTON, Idaho -- Fifteen-year-old
Trinity Hosley Anderson first became interested in electronics when, at age 12,
her beloved Game Boy broke, and she decided to fix it.
Since then, her interest in
circuits and design has grown even stronger. She recently tried to make a
Raspberry Pi, a small computer about the size of a credit card used for
emulation systems. The computer didn't work, but it did turn on - a step in the
right direction for the Kendrick Junior High School student.
The eighth-grader was among 59
students from 11 different schools to take part in Schweitzer Engineering
Laboratories' Getting Ready for Engineering and Technology Day on Thursday in
Lewiston.
Kate Wilhite, corporate
communications manager for SEL, said the event is intended to get kids excited
about fields in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
"We want to introduce the
kids to what careers in engineering are about and introduce them to high-tech
manufacturing," Wilhite said. "We hope it sparks an interest."
Hosley Anderson hopes to one
day become a forensic scientist, but she said the day's events interest her,
especially when it comes to the manufacturing of circuit boards.
"I like to see how things
are made and come up with my own ideas," she said.
Throughout the tour of SEL's
manufacturing floor - one of three activities the students took part in
throughout the day - Hosley Anderson was engaged, asking questions at the
majority of stations.
Students also took part in a
human-centered design workshop led by SEL engineers, where students were able
to design product prototypes.
David Prestwich, senior
engineering manager at SEL, said the workshop is a good introduction to
building an app.
"The whole premise is
basically to get them to understand how to design an app that someone would
want to use," he said. "They first have to know who their users
are."
Students focused on what a
"virtual backpack" app would include. As the kids questioned their
early design conceptually, it forced them to take a step back and grasp who
their audience would be, Prestwich said.
The third activity focused on electricity
and safety. Avista employees walked students through a demonstration with the
help of a small-town display.
Dusty Slagg, a journeyman
lineman at Avista, wanted to enter a trade industry after he finished his
military service. After an apprenticeship, Slagg said he makes close to six
figures in what he considers "adventurous work."
"I walked right into a
profitable career," he told students.
Sydney Martin, an eighth-grader
at Sacajawea Junior High School, said the presentation sparked an interest in a
field she hadn't previously considered.
"I want to go into
mechanics because I really like fixing things, so learning about that really
interests me because they fix power lines," Martin said.
Chris Bunce, a college
preparation program coordinator at Lincoln Middle School in Clarkston, said she
believes the event is a good way to introduce students to relevant careers.
It's the third time she's attended.
"I think it opens their
eyes, especially for some of our girls," Bunce said.
Each year the school selects a
few girls to also attend because it's important to bridge the gender gap in the
fields, she said.
Students from each school are
selected by their teachers, Wilhite said. Some wrote essays or led their class
in STEM-based courses. Participating schools included Asotin Middle School,
Genesee School, Grangeville Middle School, Jenifer Junior High, Kendrick Junior
High, Lincoln Middle School, Pomeroy Junior High, Prairie Junior High, Pullman
Christian School, Sacajawea Junior High and Orofino Junior High.
"We want to show them the
variety of things engineers do," Wilhite said, adding that the event is
part of SEL's K-12 outreach program.
A similar event will be held
for eighth-grade students next week in Pullman.
:::::::::::::
Former WSU basketball player
Ike Iroegbu shining in the G League
Could Ike join fellow Cougs
Klay Thompson and Aron Baynes in the NBA next season?
By Chet Broberg Coug Center Apr 13, 2018, 5:00am PDT
Ike Iroegbu was not selected in
the 2017 NBA Draft but after a year in the G League he’s proving he deserves an
opportunity. The former WSU guard recently wrapped up a successful first season
for the Los Angeles Clippers minor league affiliate.
Thursday, The Undefeated named
Iroegbu to their All-Ingram team of G League players who have earned a shot to
play in the Association. The team is named after Andre Ingram, who at 32 made
his NBA debut Tuesday after spending the last 10 years in the G League
(formerly known as the NBA Development League).
Ike played point guard for the
Agua Caliente Clippers, averaging 12.2 points per game across 50 contests. The
former Coug also added 4.1 rebounds and 3.9 assists a game while shooting 41.2
percent from the field.
Iroegbu finished the year
strong with 23 points in the season finale against the Iowa Wolves
If Andre Ingram’s story has
taught us anything, it’s to never give up on your dream. I just hope it doesn’t
take Ike 9 more years to make it to the NBA.
#
