Locally: Washington State’s Sam Brixey, Colton Johnsen earn All-American honors at NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships

Washington State grad students Sam Brixey and Colton Johnsen claimed All-America honors at the 2022 NCAA Division I Indoor Track & Field Championships on Saturday in Birmingham, Alabama.

Brixey matched his PR and the school record of 7.69 seconds in finishing fifth in the 60m hurdles to be a first-team All-American. He was also an All-American in the event in 2020 and 2021.

The Boise native had claimed the last spot in the eight-man finals field with a 7.69 clocking during preliminary races. The time matches the school record set by Kip Ngeno in 1975.

Johnsen, from Bellingham, who transferred from Eastern Washington as a junior, picked up NCAA Indoor second team All-America honors in the 3,000 and the mile.

He placed 14th during the preliminaries in the mile Friday, but only 11 advanced to Saturday’s final. However, his finish and time (4:03.30) earned him second team All-America in the event for the first time in his career.

On Saturday, Johnsen, who qualified last in the 16-runner 3,000 field, finished 14th, timing 8:05.62, and earning a second 2022 second-team All-America certificate.

Johnsen ended his WSU indoor career as a four-time All-American: mile (2022), 3,000 (2022 and 2021) and 5,000 (2021). He is the first Cougar to earn four indoor All-America honors since Bernard Lagat (1998, 1999).

• Whitworth’s Solo Hines and Amelia Hewson failed to match their qualifying times and wound up not advancing to the finals in the 2022 NCAA Division III Indoor Track & Field Championships during the weekend in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Hines, a freshman, tied for 19th in the 60m preliminaries, clocking 7.0. He had run a school-record 6.83. Only the top eight advanced to the finals. Amelia Hewson, a junior, was 16th in the women’s 60 hurdles, timing 9.08. She had qualified with a school-record 8.89. Again, only the top eight made the finals.

College scene

Washington State senior Taylor McCoy of Pullman finished her career with a title and school record in the College Swimming Coaches Association of America National Invitation Championship last weekend in Elkhart, Indiana.

McCoy won the 200 backstroke Saturday with a school-record time of 1:55.86, capping a career that included 13 individual wins this season and 43 in her career. The Cougars combined for five top-10 times in the meet and scored 202 points to finish 12th in a 43-team field.

Freshman Noelle Harvey was 11th in the 200 back and senior Mackenzie Duarte placed eighth in the 200 breakstroke on Saturday. Earlier in the meet, McCoy was fourth in the 400 individual medley, sophomore Hailey Grotte was ninth in the 50 breast and Harvey was 13th in the 200 free. The Cougars’ placed seventh in the 400 and 11th in the 200 freestyle relays.

• For a second straight season, Gonzaga senior Tyler Rando has been named to the 2022 Buster Posey National Collegiate Catcher of the Year Watch List by the Greater Wichita Area Sports Commission, which will announce the winner June 29.

A second-team All-West Coast Conference selection in 2021, Rando is the Bulldogs’ best batter by average (.429) with a team-high .607 slugging percentage this season. He has the second-most hits (12), RBI (6) and doubles (3) in seven starts. In five games behind the plate, he’s played errorless ball while generating 66 putouts with four assists.

• Gonzaga sophomore right-hander Gabriel Hughes was named West Coast Conference baseball pitcher of the week for his 4-3 victory over No. 4 Oklahoma State on March 4. Hughes limited the Cowboys to three hits in seven innings – he had one stretch of four hitless innings (third through sixth) – while striking out 11, one short of his career high.

• Community Colleges of Spokane collected three Northwest Athletic Conference weekly awards from its track and field team for the week of Feb. 28-March 6, and Julian Taudin-Chabot of Cheney, a redshirt sophomore at Everett, was the NWAC baseball pitcher of the week.

Although Taudin-Chabot didn’t figure in the decision in the Trojans’ 3-2 victory over Pierce, he pitched eight innings with 11 strikeouts and two walks and gave up just three hits. Both the runs Pierce scored off him were unearned.

CCS sophomore Tressa Wood was the women’s track athlete of the week for winning the women’s 10,000 meters, clocking a PR 41 minutes, 3.58 seconds at a meet in Tacoma.

Men’s track honors went to CCS freshman Jon Watkins, who won the 400m in 50.7 seconds and was a member of the Sasquatch’s 4x100 (second) and 4x400 (third) relay teams at the Tacoma meet. Bradley Fillis, a sophomore from Central Valley HS, was the field athlete of the week after he won the hammer throw (175 feet, 3 inches), discus (151-6) and shot put (50-4¾).

• Leon Rice and Tyson Degenhart, two members of the Boise State men’s basketball team with Spokane connections, collected honors from the Mountain West Conference on the heels of the Broncos’ first MWC regular-season title since 2014-15.

Rice, a former Gonzaga assistant coach and the Broncos’ head coach for 12 seasons, was named coach of the year for the first time since that 2014-15 season. Degenhart (Mt. Spokane HS) was the conference freshman of the year and All-MWC honorable mention.

Under Rice, the Broncos went 24-7 and won the school’s first outright title since 1987-88. Degenhart, a nine-time freshman of the week, started 25 of the Broncos’ 31 games, averaging 10.2 ppg and 3.9 rpg.

• For the second time in three weeks on March 6, Idaho’s Beyonce Bea was named Big Sky Conference women’s basketball player of the week following a 40-point performance in a win over Portland State.

The junior’s point total and 16 field goals were the second-most all-time in Idaho women’s basketball history. For the week, she averaged 26.5 ppg, 7.5 rpg and 2.5 apg.

• Idaho and Eastern Washington both collected individual awards when the Big Sky Conference named its 2021-22 women’s all-conference basketball teams.

Idaho grad student Louise Forysth, a transfer from Gonzaga, was named top reserve and Jaydia Martin of Eastern was the freshman of the year. Both also garnered all-conference honorable mention.

Beyonce Bea, an Idaho junior, was a unanimous selection to the all-conference first team, where she was joined by Montana redshirt junior Carmen Gfeller from Colfax. The all-conference third team includes Eastern sophomore Jacinta Buckley (Lewis and Clark HS).

• North Idaho College collected seven All-America honors for top-eight finishes at the 2022 National Junior College Athletic Association wrestling nationals March 4-5 in Council Bluffs, Iowa.

Jett Strickenberger was third at 125 pounds; Ledger Petracek (165), Devin Winston (184) and Cohle Feliciano (285) were fourth; Alfonso Martinez (157) was fifth; and Brant Porter (133) and Navarro Nanpuya (174) were seventh. All are freshmen except Feliciano, a sophomore.

• Casey Randles from Coeur d’Alene HS and Esco Walker, a transfer from North Idaho College, won individual championships to help Grand View, Iowa, capture its 10th NAIA National Wrestling Championship March 4-5 in Wichita, Kansas.

Randles, a senior and the No. 2 seed, defeated fourth-seeded and once-beaten Trenton Munoz of Hastings, Nebraska, 4-2 at 174 pounds. Walker, a junior and the No. 1 seed, beat No. 2 Brandon Orum of Life (Marietta, Georgia) 4-3 at 125.

• Scout Mathews of Eastern Washington and Melissa Huchet of Idaho shared Big Sky Conference women’s tennis player of the week honors on March 8.

Mathews, a freshman, and Huchet, a senior, both went 4-0 the previous week, winning their singles and doubles matches against Montana and Montana State. Mathews won four of five games in singles and went 2-0 in doubles. Huchet’s come-from-behind, 4-6, 7-5, 6-4 win at No. 2 singles clinched the Vandals’ team victory over Montana State.