Former Tri-City Americans star had a sizzling NHL debut. Then it all stopped

What a great way for Morgan Geekie to end his hockey season — if it’s ended.

Geekie, who played for the Tri-City Americans for four seasons through 2018, scored three goals in just two games with the National Hockey League’s Carolina Hurricanes before the NHL season was suspended last week to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Geekie played in 215 Western Hockey League games for the Americans, scoring 201 points (77 goals and 124 assists).

Last season, he was with the Hurricanes’ American Hockey League affiliate, the Charlotte Checkers, and in 73 games, the 21-year-old scored 19 goals and 27 assists for 46 points.

This season, through 55 games with the Checkers, Geekie had scored 22 goals and 20 assists for 42 points.

Then he got the call to play with the Hurricanes.

And in his first game with the team, March 8, Geekie scored two goals and an assist to help Carolina beat the Pittsbugh Penguins 6-2.

Two nights later, against Detroit, Geekie scored another goal — giving him three goals on just four shots in his NHL career.

Two days after that, the NHL suspended operations.

A pretty impressive start by the young Geekie.

Coming up

Over the next few weeks, I’ll be doing some college updates on winter and spring sports athletes from the Mid-Columbia.

A number of college spring sports athletes — especially baseball and softball — got almost a full month in before the NCAA and NAIA shut everything down.

Many track and field athletes had been competing in the winter indoor track season that began in January.

I want to take a look at the region’s top spring sports athletes — even though there will either be an abbreviated season, or none at all.

In addition, I’ll be doing some Where Are They Now-type stories, as well as features and notebooks.

Have a story idea? Email me at mrsported@aol.com or sports@tricityherald.com.

More cancellations

• The Tri-City Americans sent home their players this week, as did all Western Hockey League teams. That probably means there won’t be any WHL playoffs.

• The NWAC tried again to hold its men’s and women’s basketball championship tournaments, but to no avail.

On March 5, both tournaments were suspended (after three women’s games were played) when a student at Everett Community College came down with COVID-19 symptoms. NWAC officials immediately stopped play at Everett CC’s gymnasium, where the tournaments were being held, after being notified of the student’s symptoms.

Both men’s and women’s tournaments were moved to the Portland area this past week — women at Linn-Benton on Thursday and Friday, then over to Clackamas on Saturday and Sunday; the men all four days at Calckamas.

But before the tournament even got started, NWAC officials again suspended, then cancelled, the tournament, in light of what all sports and conferences have been doing.

Notes

• Kamiakin senior Andrew Larson, part of that Braves boys cross country pack that has won three consecutive Class 3A state team titles, signed a letter of intent this week to run cross country and track for Lewis-Clark State College next fall.

LCSC placed third last fall as a team at the NAIA national meet.

• Congrats to former Tri-Cities Fever quarterback Houston Lillard, who was named the head football coach for the Jefferson High School Democrats in Portland. Lillard has been running a football training business in the Portland region these past few years. He is the older brother of Portland Trail Blazers star Damian Lillard.

• Another former Tri-Cities Fever player, wide receiver Mike Rigell, was named the interim head coach for the Simon Fraser University football program last week. Rigell steps in for Thomas Ford, another former Fever receiver. Ford has taken a job on the University of Washington football coaching staff.

Tri-Cities Fire indoor football

With everything going on these past few weeks — state wrestling, playoff and state high school basketball, and the COVID-19 pandemic that has stopped the sports world cold — the folding of the Tri-Cities Fire has been a small blip on the news screen.

With training camp set to start in late February, Fire owner Kinshasa Martin — two days before it was set to open — announced on the team’s Facebook account that the team was shutting operations down due to financial stress.

It left some fans in the lurch who had purchased 2020 season tickets, or had purchased a two-year season ticket package last year in the team’s inaugural season.

As quick as you can say fold, the team’s Facebook account was taken down and no one could reach Martin.

Even the league the Fire played in, the American West Football Conference, couldn’t track Martin down.

Players were left without a team.

As it is, the AWFC had become a mess. Last year, in its first season, it had four teams.

This year, it had added a new team, the Yakima Canines, who would play in the Yakima Valley SunDome.

But then the Fire folded, and at around the same time another team, the Reno Xpress, announced it was sitting out of the 2020 season but planned on returning in 2021.

That left three teams – Yakima, the Idaho Horsemen, and the Wenatchee Valley Skyhawks.

The AWFC tried to find teams around the country that would be interested in joining the league. There were no takers.

The only good news out of this was that Brandon Tate, who owns the semi-pro, outdoor team, the Tri-City Rage, offered to have his football team play the Fire’s road schedule (6 games) this season. However, the Rage would get no home games in the Toyota Center.

The league agreed.

All three AWFC teams have offered the Fire season ticket holders a seat to any Rage games, with proof a Fire ticket purchase.

But last Friday, with the COVID-19, the AWFC announced the league season would be postponed until further notice.

It’s been a rough offseason, and now regular season, for the AWFC..