Cougar Athletics shooting for unbeaten weekend

It’s been a really good start to the weekend for the Washington State Cougars, as the men’s basketball team trounced Oregon State on Thursday, while the women’s team took care of the Oregon Ducks on Friday. Meanwhile, down south in Arizona, Cougar Baseball has opened the season with three consecutive wins. That makes Sunday a pretty big one, as the men can get within a game of .500 in the conference with a win over the Oregon Ducks, while the women can even their Pac-12 mark at 8-8 if they beat the Beavers. The coolest part is that you can watch both games in-person!

Basketball

The women tip off first, at noon on Pac-12 Networks Washington. This will be the final game in Beasley Coliseum for Cougar seniors Ula Motuga, Emma Nankervis and Grace Sarver. This is a good opportunity for a big senior sendoff, as Oregon State has a 3-12 conference record. As far as WSU’s postseason hopes, ESPN’s Charlie Creme currently has the Cougs among the teams with the last four byes, and slots them on the 10-seed line.

Over on the men’s side, WSU has a great opportunity to move closer to the upper half of the Pac-12 standings when it faces 6th-place Oregon. A win would pull WSU to within a game of the Ducks, who are almost certainly desperate to keep their razor-thin NCAA Tournament hopes alive. Unfortunately for WSU, Oregon has a closing slate of Oregon State, Stanford and Cal, so the Cougs really need a win Sunday if they want any hope of finishing in the top six.

Sunday is also Senior Day for D.J. Rodman and “Yukon” Jack Wilson. I don’t think that’s his actual nickname but I like it and it feels appropriate since he’s a mountain of a man so it’s staying! If you’re not able to take in the proceedings live, you can tune in to the game on FS1 at 4 p.m.

Baseball

Three games, three wins, three offensive explosions for Cougar Baseball. After scoring a measly seven runs in a win over the Villanova Wildcats on Friday, the Cougs really kicked into gear Saturday, plating 17 runs in the first game against UC-Riverside, then 22(!!!) in its second game against Villanova. I won’t go through all of the offensive numbers, because that’ll take way too long and I’m lazy, but one thing that stuck out to me - WSU was the home team in both games, so it had a total of 16 innings with at-bats. In nine of those 16 innings, WSU scored at least three runs.

WSU looks to continue its mashing ways on Sunday when it faces UC-Riverside for a second time in Peoria, Arizona. First pitch is scheduled for 11 a.m., and you can stream the proceedings via WSU’s website. But man, more power to you if you’re able to watch more than a few pitches from the stream’s vantage point. I’m not really sure why the camera is set up so that half of the screen looks at the fans in the seats, but it’s not ideal! I had Atari 2600 games with better fidelity, and that was in 1983!

Football

As we look toward 2023, how does WSU’s roster stack up against its Pac-12 counterparts? In a word, yikes. Then again, a quick glance at Stanford makes things seem a little better!

ESPN’s Bill Connelly also recently published his returning production numbers for 2023, and the Cougs have a ways to go! I won’t link it since it’s an ESPN+ story, but WSU returns 62% of its 2022 production (73% on offense and just 50% on defense). Turns out losing all of your linebackers can put a dent in figures like this! Only four Pac-12 teams return less production - Arizona, ASU, Stanford and Colorado.

THIS...IS...(the former Cougs in) THE XFL!!!

If you couldn’t get your football fix throughout the fall and early winter, or if you’re a degenerate gambler who just can’t stay away, you got to see more passes and hits on Saturday, as the XFL opened its season with a couple games. The Houston Roughnecks opened their season with a resounding 33-12 win over the Orlando Guardians (why they’re not the Orlando Breakers, I’ll never know). More importantly, former CougsMax Borghi got in on the action.

Borghi led Houston in rushing, with 42 yards on eight carries and that touchdown. Former Coug receiver Travell Harris also got some love, catching five passes for 48 yards.

Another WSU receiver, Brandon Arconado, caught three passes for 32 yards as his Arlington Renegades defeated Vegas 22-20.

This Week in Parenting

Watching the Super Bowl last Sunday, the 11 year-old noticed something. “Dad, Hurts changed his cleats. He was wearing different ones when he started.” Sure enough, like a minute later, the announcers confirmed as much. “

• You walk past your piles of clean clothes every day, and I have to constantly remind you to put the toilet seat down, but you notice a guy wearing new cleats?”
• “It’s the little things, dad.” Indeed it is.

The high schooler is headed out next weekend for a Junior ROTC drill meet, all the way over in Melbourne, FL. They’re driving eight hours on Friday, conducting the drill meet Saturday morning, and driving back Saturday evening. Eff. That. Anyhoo, at dinner the other night, the 11 year-old asked him what he did on the drill team. Before the teenager could get five words out, younger brother said, “I’m already bored.” and pushed his chair from the table. Pretty solid setup and delivery.

Elsewhere, there are many instances in which Mrs. Kendall and I leave one or both of the kids to see themselves out of the house in the morning, usually the 5th-grader. About half the time, I return home from work to find the front door unlocked. Despite several reminders, this keeps happening. You might recall above where the 5th-grader professes to noticing the little things. Apparently securing our valuables does not meet his importance threshold.

I finally asked him why he keeps leaving the door unlocked. “Nobody is going to come to this neighborhood and rob our house.” Oh. Well I guess that settles it, though I’m not sure he has any solid data to back up that assertion. The struggle continues.

Dortmund Fan Since Forever

Will the Black and Yellows ever lose another game? Many are asking!

After getting payback over SV Werder Bremen last weekend, for a gutting early season defeat, BVB 09 faced EPL blueblood Chelsea in a UEFA Champions League game midweek. It was rather harrowing, as Chelsea had many more chances at a goal, but Dortmund’s star Karim Adeyimi only needed one chance.

I would take multiple bullets for that kid.

Combine that goal with Gregor Kobel’s brick wall impression, and Dortmund took the first leg of the quarterfinals.

As I write this, Dortmund leads 2-0, and with a win will move into a tie atop the Bundesliga standings(!!!!!!). But since we can never have nice things, Adeyimi - one goal and one assist today - limped off the field with an obvious hamstring injury. God. Dammit.

Even so, HEJA BVB.

Non-Sports

Inside UnitedHealth’s Effort to Deny Coverage for a Patient’s Care — ProPublica
After a college student finally found a treatment that worked, the insurance giant decided it wouldn’t pay for the costly drugs. His fight to get coverage exposed the insurer’s hidden procedures for rejecting claims.

The Man Who Invented Himself | Defector
There is a perspective on the world that only comes through the windows of a car. There is what's inside, and what's outside; there's the world and the people in it and their lives, and then there's the person watching it through glass.