This space is usually reserved to high school sports events that are coming up.
But before we look forward, let’s take a look back to some events that may have gotten lost in the long shadow cast by high school and college football on Fridays and Saturday.
On Friday, the 50th annual Hudson’s Bay Run-A-Ree brought together more than 400 competitors, but it was the efforts of two runners in particular that will highlight here.
It’s somewhat hard to imagine, but Skyview senior Priscilla Timmons seems to get better.
Last year’s Timmons set a personal best by winning the Run-A-Ree in 18 minutes, 44 seconds — winning by more than 30 seconds.
On Friday, Timmons ran the course in 18:18 and won by more than a minute.
Not to be outdone, Washougal senior Dylan Croeni won the boys race, cruising through in a course-record time of 15:41 and winning by 23 seconds.
The Prairie girls cross country team was one of the few Clark County teams not at the Run-A-Ree. But the Falcons also opened the season with a solid performance at the Capital Invitational in Olympia.
Taylor Guenther has also made great strides in the offseason. She posted the fastest time by a Class 3A runner at the Capital Invite, placing second in the Juniors race in 14:32 for the 2.33-mile course.
Lindsay Tompkins won the Sophomores race in 14:48, and the Falcons have another solid runner in Nicole Goecke, who placed second in the Freshmen race in 15:33.
The Columbia River girls soccer team won the 3A state championship last season with a lineup that was senior-dominated.
But the next class of Chieftains is looking to keep up the high standards of River soccer.
River lost its season opener 2-1 Saturday to Issaquah, the 4A state runner-up last season. The Chieftains got off to a good start scoring early as Bri Brown punched in a corner kick from Eden Behrens. But Issaquah countered with a tying goal late in the first half and scored the winning goal with about five minutes left in the match.
In tennis, Mountain View made the trip north to play in the Auburn Invitational Team Tournament and reached the championship match against Sehome, the defending 2A state team champion.
Sehome swept all three singles matches. Mountain View countered by winning three doubles match, but was unable to pull out the fourth, giving Sehome a 4-3 victory.
One of the Thunder’s doubles victories was by Trover Jones and Dan Garmire, who scored a thrilling 4-6, 6-1, 7-6 victory over Matt Goebel and Payton Weldenbacher, who reached the 2A doubles state finals last season.
In volleyball, Columbia River captured the Battle Ground Invitational title with a 25-17, 25-10 over Kalama. Ripley Waldow and Grace Boyer-Quick earned all-tournament honors for the Chieftains. Ridgefield knocked off host Battle Ground to claim third place, not bad for a 1A program against a 4A program on its home floor.
The week ahead
GOLF: Tuesday brings the return of the Mountain View Invitational at Rose City Golf Course in Portland. The tournament includes just about every boys golf program in Southwest Washington.
And as Southwest Washington has become a hotbed for prep golf, it should be a good event.
Here’s a list of prep golfers who have shot par or better in regular-season matches so far this season: Chad Hall of Battle Ground, Mario Alongi and Conner Nash of Skyview, Alistair Docherty and Andrew Spicer of Union (Docherty has accomplish the feat twice so far), Brett Johnson of Ridgefield, Taylor Smith of Mountain View and Nick Huff of Hockinson.
VOLLEYBALL and SOCCER: The 4A Greater St. Helens League opened league play in both sports last Thursday. The 3A and 2A GSHL enter league play on Tuesday. On Thursday, Union and Skyview meet in girls soccer as 4A GSHL rivals for the first time. The match will be at 5 p.m. at Kiggins Bowl.
CROSS COUNTRY: League meets begin Tuesday in the 4A and 3A GSHL. Those leagues are combining forces to make for meaningful regular-season meets. Each Tuesday there will be quadrangular meets featuring a pair of 4A teams and a pair of 3A teams. This Tuesday, there will be meets at Round Lake in Camas, Lewisville Park north of Battle Ground and Harmony Park in east Vancouver.
And most teams will be heading to invitational meets on Saturday. The one meet that will draw the most local traffic is the Seaside (Ore.) Three-Course Challenge. Runners from Battle Ground, Heritage, Union, Hockinson, Woodland, La Center and Seton Catholic scheduled to compete.
BOYS TENNIS: League matches begin this week, and the biggest match is Wednesday at Skyview, when the Storm host Union.
If everything goes according to plan, it will be the first of three regular-season matchups of Union’s Alex Wallace and Skyview’s Kent Andreasen, Clark County’s top two players and maybe two of the best prep players in the state.
Wallace was the Class 3A singles runner-up last season, and Andreasen was the 4A state singles runner-up.
This season, they will both play at Class 4A. And after spending two years in the Tri-Cities, the 4A state tennis tournament returns to the Vancouver Tennis Center next May. Will Wednesday’s match be a state final preview?
FOOTBALL: The first Thursday football game of the season happens this week, when Woodland plays at Battle Ground. The rest of the action happens Friday with Heritage face Skyview in the 4A GSHL opener for both teams.
Tim Martinez is the assistant sports editor/prep coordinator for The Columbian. He can be reached by phone at (360) 735-4538 or e-mail at tim.martinez@columbian.com
