A Chiawana grad scores 1,000 career points at college
Chiawana graduate Braydey Hodgins scored her career 1,000th point for Boise State University’s women’s basketball team on Saturday.
Hodgins scored a team-high 17 points to lead the Broncos to a 65-59 win over Utah State in a Mountain West Conference game.
She becomes the 22nd BSU player to reach the mark.
“The road win is most important,” said Hodgins after the game to the media. “I think (the milestone) is really cool for my family, it’s a big milestone for anyone’s career.”
BSU Coach Gordy Presnell was happy for Hodgins, a senior.
“I’m really proud of her,” he said. “She’s had quite a career, and a 1,000 points is a really great milestone. It’s a lot more than that. It’s what she’s done for our program. She’s hit critical shots at critical times and has been a winner.”
She also becomes the third of the three Hodgins sisters to achieve the mark in college.
Older sisters Hayley and Delaney played for Eastern Washington University.
Middle sister Delaney Hodgins — now Delaney Bruce, and playing professionally in Finland — is Eastern’s all-time leading scorer with 2,120 points.
Oldest sister Hayley Hodgins – now Hayley Middleton and coach the Richland High girls basketball team – had 1,862 points at EWU and was the school’s leading scorer until Delaney broke her record.
Kamiakin coach earns national award
Kamiakin boys cross country coach Matt Rexus was named the Washington State High School boys cross country coach of the year for 2019 last week by the United States Track and Field/Cross Country Coaches Association.
It marks the second consecutive year Rexus has been so honored by the organization.
Rexus’ boys team has won the Class 3A state team title for three consecutive years.
It’s also interesting to note that it’s three straight cross country and track seasons now that someone from the Mid-Columbia has been named by the USTFCCCA as boys coach of the year.
Rexus was cross country coach of the year in 2018, then Walla Walla’s Eric Hisaw was state boys track and field coach of the year in spring of 2019, and now Rexus again in 2019 cross country.
Dust Devils coaching staff set
The San Diego Padres named their minor-league coaching staffs for the 2020 season.
The Tri-City Dust Devils, the Padres’ short-season A Northwest League affiliate, will have a new manager this coming season in Vinny Lopez.
Lopez was an Arizona League rookie team manager last year for the Padres organization.
Mike McCoy, who managed the Dust Devils the last two seasons, has been promoted to manage Lake Elsinore in the High-A California League.
Last year’s pitching coach for the Dust Devils, Leo Rosales, has been assigned to Fort Wayne of the long-season Class A as its pitching coach.
The Dust Devils’ 2019 hitting coach, Oscar Salazar, will manage one of the Padres’ two Arizona League teams this summer.
Lopez’s Dust Devils staff will include pitching coach Gorman Heimueller, hitting coach Raul Gonzalez, and fielding coach Luis Mendez.
Heimueller was the Padres roving minor league pitching instructor in 2019; Gonzalez was the hitting coach for the Arizona League Padres from 2017-19; and Mendez is a first-year coach.
More signings
Three more area athletes have signed recently to play sports next year for community colleges:
Chiawana’s Kylee Alvarez will play women’s soccer for Columbia Basin College.
Kiona-Benton’s Nya Calzadillas has signed to play volleyball in the fall for Yakima Valley Community College.
And Chiawana’s Nasyra Gibson will play women’s soccer for Walla Walla Community College.
Notes
▪ Pasco High graduate Sebastian Gutierrez was named a second-team Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference North Division all-star for the Minot State football team.
Gutierrez — a 6-foot-6, 295-pound junior offensive lineman — was part of an offensive line that surrendered just 13 sacks all season.
Minot State went 3-8 last fall.
▪ Jake Albright (Walla Walla CC) scored 10 points and grabbed 6 rebounds to help the Lewis-Clark State College men’s basketball team beat Montana Western 91-63 on Jan. 9.
▪ Jansen Edmiston (Hermiston) scored 12 points and had 7 rebounds, but it wasn’t enough as Lewis-Clark State College lost 71-69 to Rocky Mountain in women’s basketball play on Jan. 11.
▪ Leilani Mitchell (Kennewick) scored 21 points and grabbed 5 rebounds to lead the Southside Flyers over the Melbourne Boomers 75-73 in overtime in a WNBL game in Australia on Jan. 12.
▪ Former Tri-City American goalie Carey Price stopped 31 shots and earned his second shutout of the National Hockey League season on Jan. 13, leading the Montreal Canadiens past the Calgary Flames 2-0.
Price has a 20-16-0-4 record in net this season for the Canadiens, whose 22-21-7 record ranked them 12th of 16 teams in the Eastern Conference.
Price surrenders an average of 2.84 goals a game, and has a save percentage of .908.
▪ Linebacker Lakota Wills (Richland) played in eight games this past football season for the 11-2 Air Force Falcons. Wills had 36 tackles (6 of them for loss), and recovered one fumble.
▪ Dre Dorton (Chiawana) finished his collegiate career with 27 pass receptions for the 7-5 Eastern Washington University Eagles. That accounted for 477 yards and 4 touchdowns.
Dorton was also the top kickoff returner, returning 15 kicks for an average of 20.07 yards. That included a 90-yard kickoff return for a touchdown.
Teammate Darreon Moore (Kamiakin) played at defensive back, and had 29 tackles this season. He also had a fumble recovery.
▪ Sam Colbray (Hermiston) is 9-5 this season at 184 pounds for the Iowa State University wrestling team. Head coach Kevin Dresser announced this week that he was moving Colbray down to 174 pounds, likely for the rest of the season.
▪ Justin Wagar (Kennewick) led his Grambling State University women’s soccer team to a 10-10-1 record this past fall. That gives the third-year head coach a 36-22-3 record at Grambling.
▪ Former Tri-City American Riley Sawchuk scored his first career hat trick in the Western Hockey League on Sunday, leading the Edmonton Oil Kings over the Medicine Hat Tigers 4-2.
Sawchuk, who was traded to Edmonton by Tri-City last May, scored a natural hat trick in the game, meaning his three goals were consecutive and uninterrupted by another player scoring.
Ironically, getting the win in goal was Beck Warm, who was traded earlier this month by the Americans to the Oil Kings.
Warm stopped 30 of 32 shots in the game.
▪ Kamiakin’s Jeremiah Kennell announced on Twitter this weekend that he’s committing to Whitworth University to play baseball there in the spring of 2021.
▪ Chiawana senior defensive lineman Bridger Feldmann made an official visit to Central Washington University over the weekend.
Feldmann was the Mid-Columbia Conference Defensive Player of the Year, and was named first-team all-state for Class 4A by The Associated Press.
This story was originally published January 20, 2020 at 2:58 PM.