Locally: Washington State’s Morgan Weaver, Ella Dederick attend national soccer camp
Washington State sophomore Morgan Weaver and redshirt junior Ella Dederick are attending the U-23 Women’s National Soccer Team camp in Carson, California, that runs through Thursday.
Twenty-three college players and three National Women’s Soccer League players were invited to the first camp of 2018 at the U.S. Soccer National Training Center.
For Weaver, a forward from University Place, Washington, it is her second invite to a U-23 national team camp. She also participated in the final camp of 2017 in Orlando, Florida.
Weaver finished the season with a team-best 17 points and seven goals. In her career, she has 15 goals, seven of them winners, and 33 points. The 15 goals are just outside the WSU career top-10 list after just two seasons.
This is the first trip to the U-23 WNT camp for Dederick, a goalkeeper from Camarillo, California. One of four keepers in camp, she stood out in the NCAA Tournament with a six-save shutout of No. 8 UCF in the opening round and a pair of shootout saves in a win over No. 20 Tennessee in the second round.
The third-team All-Pac-12selection had 11 shutouts during the season, the second most in WSU history, second best in the conference and ninth in Division I.
College scene
Kinsey Pease, a senior two-sport athlete at Arizona Christian University from Cheney, was the school’s female recipient of the Golden State Athletic Conference Cliff Hamlow Champions of Character Award.
The award is given to one male and one female student-athlete from each of the nine schools in the GSAC who demonstrate athletic achievement, campus and community leadership, and embrace the five core character values of the NAIA Champions of Character program – respect, responsibility, integrity, sportsmanship and servant leadership.
Pease, a setter on the volleyball team and hurdler and javelin thrower on the women’s track and field team, also was named to the CoSIDA Academic All-District College Division Volleyball team with a 4.0 grade-point average in secondary education after collecting NAIA and GSAC scholar-athlete honors.
A transfer from Clark Community College in Vancouver, Washington, she led the Firestorm with 414 assists after switching to setter as a senior. Last spring, she set the school record in the women’s javelin at 119 feet, 4 inches.
- A career day helped Boise State sophomore guard Riley Lupfer from Lewis and Clark earn Mountain West Conference Player of the Week honors in women’s basketball. Lupfer highlighted her week on Saturday against UNLV, setting personal bests with 28 points, nine field goals and seven 3-pointers in a 69-60 victory. She scored 15 in the first half and her 7-of-14 effort from behind the arc tied for third most in Boise State single-game history. Two days earlier, she had a clutch fourth quarter in a 62-58 win at Colorado State. Lupfer hit a pair of key 3-pointers, highlighting an 11-point game as the Broncos held off the Rams to complete a 12-point comeback. In the two games, she averaged 19.5 points and shot 50 percent (10 of 20) from 3-point range.
- Senior basketball players Bogdan Bliznyuk and Delaney Hodgins were named the Eastern Washington Scholar-Athletes for December. Bliznyuk, born in the Ukraine and a graduate of Todd Beamer High School in Federal Way, Washington, averaged 21.9 points, 6.8 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 1.3 steals in eight games in December. It included a 31-point game at San Francisco, 29 points at North Dakota and a near triple double in another game. The business management major has a 3.31 GPA. Hodgins, from Chiawana High in Pasco, averaged 21 points, 7.5 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 1.8 steals in eight games. She was named to the Traveler’s Invitational all-tournament team after scoring 55 points and shooting 40.4 percent in three games. In December, she also ran her double-digit scoring streak to 10 games, raising her career total to 90. She has a 3.86 GPA in health informatics technology and management.
- Two Gonzaga men’s soccer players – Christo Michaelson and Joe Corner – have received postseason accolades. Senior midfielder Michaelson was voted to the 2017 United Soccer Coaches NCAA Division I Men’s All-Far West Region third team and freshman midfielder Corner was Top Drawer Soccer’s 96th-ranked freshman nationally. Michaelson, from Lake Oswego, Oregon, started all 16 games he played and was named All-West Coast Conference second team after leading the Bulldogs with four goals and adding an assist. He was All-WCC honorable mention as a junior. Corner, from Salem, Oregon, made an immediate impact for the Zags and was named to the WCC All-Freshman Team. He had one goal and four assists, starting 12 of the 17 games in which he played. His assists were ranked second on the team.
Johnathan Williams of Gonzaga and Delaney Hodgins of Eastern Washington are among 30 men’s and 30 women’s basketball players nationwide nominated for the Senior CLASS Award. Williams, from Memphis, Tennessee, recently completed his bachelor’s degree with a concentration in entrepreneurship and innovation and will begin in GU’s masters’ program next semester. He is averaging 13.6 points and a team-best 7.5 rebounds per game and is on watch lists for the Naismith Trophy and Wooden Award. Hodgins is the Preseason Big Sky Player of the Year and is chasing Eastern’s all-time career women’s scoring record. This season the Pasco native has scored in double figures in 13 games and has seven games with 20 or more points. She is the second EWU student-athlete to be named a Senior CLASS candidate this season. Chloe Williams was earlier selected in women’s soccer. CLASS is an acronym for Celebrating Loyalty and Achievement for Staying in School and focuses on senior players’ contributions on and off the court. In February, the lists will be cut to 10 finalists. Gonzaga’s Przemek Karnowski was on the Senior CLASS All-American team in 2017.
Spencer Blackburn, a junior center at Eastern Washington, has been named to the 20th annual Academic All-Star Team selected by the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision Athletic Directors Association. From Bellingham, he has a 3.66 GPA as a professional accounting major and is the 21st Eagle selected to the team since the award began in 1998. His coach, Aaron Best, was on the 1999 team. Blackburn, who has made 22 career starts in 24 games, later this month will repeat on the Big Sky Conference All-Academic team. In 2016, he was a selected to the Hero Sports Sophomore All-America team after his 2015 season was wiped out with a thumb injury and was also second team All-Big Sky.
Ben White, a senior defender at Gonzaga, is one of 60 Division I college players invited to the 2018 Major League Soccer Player Combine in Orlando, Florida, that runs Thursday through Jan. 17. Representatives from all 23 MLS clubs will be scouting the top college prospects ahead of the SuperDraft in Philadelphia on Jan. 19. White, a four-time All-West Coast Conference selection, had a goal or an assist on eight of GU’s 19 goals this season and started all 17 matches in which he played. He had three goals and a team-leading 11 points and was sixth in the WCC in assists with five, all while leading a defense that allowed one goal or less in nine games.