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- WSU was established in 1890
- WSU's original name was Washington State Agricultural College and School of Sciences
- The name changed to State College of Washington in 1905
- The name changed once, and for all, to Washington State University in 1959
- The first varsity football game was played in 1894
- WSC beat Idaho 10-0
- WSU and Idaho would go on to play each other 90 more times
- WSU has won 71 of these meetings
- The last meeting probably had the most entertaining ending...
- WSU and Idaho also have the longest basketball rivalry (non-Ivy League category) in the nation
- The teams have met on the court 270 times since 1906, with WSU winning 162 of those
- Another big rivalry game is something called the Apple Cup
- That football game has been played 107 times
- WSU has won
32a bunch of those meetings - The first Apple Cup was played in 1900
- It was played in Seattle
- That game ended in a 5-5 tie
- Those kind of scores happened a lot back then
- It seems kind of weird now that those kind of scores happened a lot back then
- The next meeting was played in 1901
- It was played in Pullman
- WSU shutout UW 10-0
- That game was played at Rogers Field
- Rogers Field was the first home stadium for WSU
- It was also called Soldier Field before 1902
- The first game was played at Rogers Field in 1895
- WSU beat Idaho 10-4
- 10-4 is also a very weird football score that was normal back then
- Rogers Field was constructed entirely out of wood because, honestly, what's the worst thing that could happen to a wood stadium?
- It held 23,500 people
- In 1969 Idaho started playing home games at Rogers Field
- In 1970 it was severely damaged by fire
- To answer my previous question, severe fire damage is the worst thing that could happen to a wood stadium
- The fires was suspected to be started by arson
- WSU chose to play their home games in Spokane
- Meanwhile, Idaho chose to continue to play their games in Pullman in a mostly destroyed Rogers Field
- WSU played all of their home games at Joe Albi Stadium until 1972
- On September 30, 1972, WSU opened Martin Stadium with a 19-point loss to Utah
- Deone Bucannon graduated from Washington State University
- Deone Bucannon can hit people really hard
- Little known fact: WSU's mascot is the Cougars
- The school officially adopted the mascot in 1919
- Before then, the official mascot was "Squirt," a terrier dog
- Also in the early day, the school's official colors were pink and blue.
- After adopting the nickname Cougars, the school used a stuffed cougar as their mascot
- That was replaced by live cougar cub in 1927
- The cub was given to the school by then Governor, Rowland Hartley
- The original name for the cub was going to be "Governor Hartley"
- Thankfully, the Governor declined to have it named after him
- The cub was then named Butch
- It was named after WSU's star QB Herbert "Butch" Meeker
- Meeker was only 5'5" and 150 pounds
- The Chinook yearbook had nothing but nice things to say about Meeker in his playing days
"The fightingest little football player ever to don a Cougar uniform," - Chinook Yearbook on Meeker
- WSU would continue to have live cougar mascots until 1978
- WSU has played in 11 bowl games
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The last one was the New Mexico Bowl in 2013 - The last one was the Holiday Bowl in 2003
- WSU beat Texas in the 2003 Holiday Bowl 28-20
- The first bowl game WSU played in was the 1916 Rose Bowl
- This was the 2nd ever Rose Bowl played
- The first Rose Bowl was played in 1902 and Michigan beat Stanford 49-0
- Because of the blow out, according to Wikipedia, the Rose Festival organizers soured on the idea of football, opting instead for "chariot races and ostrich races"
- Ostrich races sound the best thing ever
- WSU won the 1916 Rose Bowl 14-0 over Brown
- Footage from that Rose Bowl can be found on YouTube
- WSU players acted as extras in the movie "Tom Brown of Harvard" before practice everyday leading up to the game
- The film was released in 1918
- They were paid $100 for their acting work
- The NCAA barely existed/wasn't nearly as strict/had better things to think about
- The BCS and the College Football Playoff actually didn't exist
- WSU finished the 1916 season undefeated
- WSU was one of 3 teams that claim a national championship for the 1915-16 season
- The Washington State Senate recently recognized their national championship claim
- As far as I'm concerned, that's all we need for that to be legit
- The next couple years, 1916 and 1917, WSU basketball had a stellar season of their own
- Cougar basketball finished the '16-'17 season with a 25-1 record
- Their only loss came on the road in a 20-28 loss to California
- 20-28 would seem like a low score but, (1) it wasn't back then and (2) it's actually a high scoring game if you're used to watching Bennett-Ball
- The team was crowned national champions by the Helms Foundation
- Head coach Fred Bohler would coach at WSU for 18 seasons
- His overall record was 226-177
- Bohler even served as the head baseball coach for 4 seasons
- WSU dedicated Bohler gym to him in 1928
- Bohler was replaced as basketball coach by Karl Schlademan
- Schlademan acted as both track and basketball coach for 3 seasons
- I'm only using Schlademan to get to the next guy
- Schlademan was replaced by Jack Friel as head basketball coach in 1928
- Friel would remain in the position for 30 years
- Friel went 495-377 as head coach
- He led WSU to 4 Pacific Coast Conference titles
- WSU appeared in the 8 team 1941 NCAA tournament
- WSU would get to the championship game of the 1941 tournament and lose 39-34 to Wisconsin
- After leaving WSU, Friel would go on to be the first commissioner of the Big Sky conference
- The first office of the Big Sky conference was in Pullman
- It remained in the home town of a college that wasn't in the conference for 8 years before moving to Boise
- WSU dedicated the home basketball court in Beasley Coliseum to Friel
- I used to love hearing Glenn Johnson say "it's time to Friel the heat" before basketball games
- Beasley Coliseum holds 11,671 people.
- It opened in 1973, and you can totally tell. I mean... Just look at those seat colors...
- Those orange seats in Beasley are old and weird (picture courtesy WSU Athletic Communications)
- The first event in Beasley was an NBA preseason game between the Sonics and Blazers
- The game in Beasley was the first Sonics win for new coach Bill Russell
- Spencer Haywood checked in with 26 points and 12 rebounds
- 8,136 people were on hand for the game
- Beasley also hosted the 1st and 2nd rounds of the NCAA Tournament in 1975, 1982, 1985
- It would be funny to hear Kentucky or Duke (or Gonzaga) complain no-a-days about having to travel and stay in Pullman for a whole weekend. We should put the tournament there next year just to hear people complain
- That was a pretty good Gonzaga burn
- Deone Bucannon was a safety for the Washington State University football team
- Deone Bucannon did this once
- That was a good hit
- I just really wanted an excuse to post this again
- Outside of the football and basketball teams from earlier, WSU claims only 2 NCAA national championships
- WSU won the 1937 title in boxing
- The 1977 WSU track and field team edged out UTEP by only 1/2 of a point to claim the national championship
- Future Olympic medalist Bernard Lagat was 3 when WSU claimed that title (bonus fact: I'm very good at transitions)
- Lagat moved from Kenya and began attending WSU in 1996
- Lagat was named Pac-10 athlete of the year in 1999
- He left school in 2000 to compete in the Sydney Olympics where he won bronze in the 1500m
- He returned to school and graduted int 2001 with a degree in Management Information Systems
- My college roommate majored in management information systems and I still don't really have a clue what it is
- My college roommate is nothing like Bernard Lagat. Like at all...
- WSU, as a school, will have been around for 125 years as of March 28, 2015
- WSU, as a football program, has been around for 122 years, with a record of 500-526-48
- Fact: WSU will continue to exist forever and ever
- Even bigger fact: WSU will continue to be the greatest place on Earth forever and ever
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Football
WSU spring football: Cougars want faster defense - Spokesman.com - March 25, 2015
PULLMAN – The Washington State football players will emerge on Thursday from a winter spent in their expansive new weight room. But to the public, able to see the Cougars at the 2:30 p.m. Martin Stadium practice for the first time since the Apple Cup, WSU will look pretty much the same.
Baseball
College baseball: Cougars off to rough start - Spokesman.com - March 25, 2015
PULLMAN – Washington State played seven baseball games on the road in 10 days and the worst team they faced, San Diego, is on the verge of being ranked in the college baseball polls.