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Thursday, May 13, 2021
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Brown enters offseason as favorite to be Ducks’ starting QB
By JAMES CREPEA
The Oregonian
EuGENE — Far and away the
most significant change to Oregon’s
roster from 2020 to 2021, Tyler
shough’s transfer to Texas Tech took
what was an open door at quarterback
and blew it off the hinges. Anthony
Brown has all but closed it at this
point, though.
The only quarterback with any
game experience on the roster, Brown
entered spring as the starter and left it
as the starter, much as shough did a
year ago. The difference of course is
the ducks aren’t linked to a graduate
OREGON QB POST-SPRING DEPTH CHART
Anthony Brown: 6-foot-2, 226 pounds, graduate senior
Jay Butterfield: 6-foot-6, 212 pounds, redshirt freshman
Ty Thompson: 6-foot-4, 215 pounds, true freshman
Robby Ashford: 6-foot-3, 225 pounds, redshirt freshman
transfer this offseason and the three
freshmen battling for the backup
spot, Jay Butterfield, Ty Thompson
and robby ashford, have never taken
a snap in a college game.
Mario Cristobal will wait until
fall camp to formalize Brown as the
starter, but it’s hard to envision a real-
istic scenario in which he loses the job
before the season opener.
“We think anthony is the one, he’s
the one that’s leading, but we’re not
going to let that die,” Cristobal said.
“We’re going to keep that engaged
and rolling as we get into the summer.
But that battle for the two spot has
really tightened.”
By all accounts, Brown got all the
first team reps during the spring. He
certainly did during the first scrim-
mage and spring game, when he was
17-of-26 for 208 yards and a touch-
down, and had a fumble.
Brown admitted the spring game
wasn’t his best performance, but
given the absences from the starting
secondary it’s hard to make much of
any of those numbers.
The competition won’t be offi-
cially over for 90 or so days, and while
outside expectations are obviously for
Brown to be the starter, Cristobal isn’t
counting anyone out yet.
“really proud of the way anthony
is running the offense,” Cristobal
said. “you can’t take anything away
from that, but in this program there’s
no room for relax time. It’s not going
to make anybody better, handing off
and saying ‘hey, you’re good to go’
is not going to enhance the compet-
itive character of our football team.
so we’re going to turn it up and we’re
going to turn it up on everybody and
we expect to get really good results
from that.”
The bottom line is it’s Brown job to
lose. he’s experienced and skilled, but
also hasn’t played against the best of
competition during his career, though
that might not change much this fall
when looking at Pac-12 secondaries.
PREP CROSS-COUNTRY
COLLEGE BASKETBALL
READY TO SOAR
Two from
EOu make
academic
all-district
Hermiston’s Amanda
Nygard signs to run for
Eastern Washington
By ANNIE FOWLER
East Oregonian
East Oregonian
H
ErMIsTON — amanda Nygard
is a homebody. The longest she
has been away from home was
for a week for a running camp a
couple of years ago.
This fall, Nygard will have to make it longer
than a week after signing to run cross-country
and track at Eastern Washington university.
“It will be different,” the Hermiston senior
said. “I will miss my friends. I keep getting a
little sad, but I’m excited too.”
Nygard is no stranger to EWu. her mom,
amy, went to school there, and the two went
for a campus visit before COVId-19 hit last
year.
she also knows a couple of people on the
track team, including former hermiston team-
mate Madi Wilson.
Nygard recently narrowed her choices to
EWu and Gonzaga, but chose to run for the
Kathy Aney/East Oregonian, File
Amanda Nygard, of Hermiston, takes off at the start of the 2019 Bulldog Fest cross-country
run.
Eagles after a talk with EWu cross-country
coach and distance coach sam read.
“Talking to both coaches, the Eastern
coach cared about me as a person, and I liked
how he ran things,” said Nygard, who will
major in business administration. “The coach
was a big deciding factor.”
While Nygard excelled at both sports at
See Nygard, Page A10
hegarty wins NWC golf honor at Whitworth College
By ANNIE FOWLER
East Oregonian
sPOKaNE, Wash. — a Pendleton high
school graduate was named the Northwest
Conference Player of the year
for men’s golf.
Whitworth College’s
reilly hegarty finished
among the top five in five
of the six events he played,
including a third-place finish
at the NWC spring Classic
(april 3-4) and a tie for fourth
Hegarty
place at the NWC Fall Clas-
sic (March 27-28). He led the Pirates in scor-
ing average (74.09) over 11 rounds of golf this
spring.
hegarty won the Northwest Conference
Tournament (April 17-18) with a score of 145,
which included a tournament best 66 in the
second round.
hegarty also was a second team all-Con-
ference honoree in 2019.
Lane Maher
Maher (Pendleton) set the College of Idaho
record in the 110 hurdles on april 30, with an
NAIA qualifying time of 14.68 seconds at the
Buc scoring Invitational in spokane, Wash-
ington. The time broke his own school record
of 14.77 set on april 24 at the raider Invita-
tional in ashland.
The previous record of 14.87 was set by
Brooks Ney in 2016.
Maher, a freshman, also
owns the College of Idaho
record for the 60-meter
indoor hurdles at 8.47.
Maher will run in the
Cascade Collegiate Confer-
ence Championships on May
14-15 in La Grande.
Maher
Maher owns the 23rd best
time in the nation at the NaIa level through
May 8.
Bekah Roe
A shortstop for Warner Pacific, Roe (Pilot
rock) and four of her Knights teammates
skipped graduation ceremo-
nies to play in the Cascade
Collegiate Conference soft-
ball Championship on May
7-8 in Ashland.
The Knights opened with a
3-0 loss to Oregon Tech, beat
Corban university 4-2, and
ended the tournament with an
Roe
8-4 loss to College of Idaho.
In her final at-bat, Roe hit a two-run single
against College of Idaho.
For the season, roe had 16 hits, including
four doubles, a home run and 10 rBIs.
Doc Porter
a graduate student at Central Washington
University, Porter (Pendleton) finished second
in the 400 with a time of 49.44 seconds at the
39th annual ralph Varnacchia Meet on May 1
in Bellingham, Washington.
Porter also ran the anchor
leg on the winning 4x400
relay team that clocked
in at 3:24.62. also on the
team were austin albertin,
Gunner Vallatini and spen-
cer solvberg.
Porter
Porter will compete at the
Great Northwest athletic Conference Cham-
pionships on May 14-15 in Portland. he will
run the 400, the 4x400 relay, and the 4x100
relay.
Porter’s best time in the 400 meters at
CWu is 49.02.
Jansen Edmiston
A fifth-year senior at Lewis-Clark State
College, Edmiston (hermiston) was named
to the CosIda academic
all-district team. she was
voted to the six-person team
out of a field of 35 candidates.
Edmiston has a 3.95 GPa
with a double major in busi-
ness administration and
psychology, with a minor
Edmiston
in Spanish. She is the fifth
Warrior in program history
to be named academic all-district.
The 5-foot-9 guard also was voted a first-
team all-Cascade Conference selection
after averaging 10.2 points and 4.1 rebounds
per game. she started all 20 games for the
Warriors.
La GraNdE – a pair of Eastern
Oregon university student-athletes —
Max McCullough and Taylor stricklin —
have been named academic all-district
honorees by the College sports Informa-
tion directors of america, the organiza-
tion announced recently.
For McCullough, a
redshirt senior, this is
his is second CosIda
academic all-district
award, after earning the
award last season for his
performance in the class-
McCullough
room.
Now in his fifth season
at EOu, McCullough has
already completed his
undergraduate degree,
having received his Bach-
elor of science in busi-
ness administration with
an emphasis in market-
Stricklin
ing and management. he
graduated with a 3.81 cumulative GPA,
and currently holds a cumulative GPa of
3.94 while pursing his Master of Business
administration.
McCullough has played in 112 games
in a Mountaineers uniform. In five total
seasons at EOu, McCullough has been
part of a squad that has gone 85-43.
McCullough currently stands as the EOu
career leader in points scored and is the
only player in history to eclipse 2,000
career points, at 2,061. he has averaged
18.4 points per game in four years on a
career shooting percentage of 45.2%.
For Stricklin, this is her first Academic
all-district award.
The senior currently boasts a 3.99
GPa while majoring in health and human
performance. she was named First
Team academic all-Conference for the
spring season and was tabbed a daktron-
ics-NaIa scholar athlete for the 2019-20
academic year. On the hardwood, stricklin
has appeared in 51 total games for Eastern
and been a starter in 46 of those contests.
In her two-year span at EOu, stricklin
has shot 39.8% from the floor overall and is
a 34.2% 3-point shooter. she has averaged
9.1 points per game and 4.8 rebounds per
contest in two years of play. The Moun-
taineers have gone 38-14 since Stricklin’s
arrival.
Both athletes are now eligible for
academic all-american status now. The
2021 CosIda academic all-american
Teams for men’s and women’s basketball
will be announced on Tuesday, May 19.
SPORTS SHORT
EWU QB Eric Barriere highlights AP FCS All-America team
By RALPH D. RUSSO
AP College Football Writer
ChENEy, Wash. — East-
ern Washington quarterback Eric
Barriere, sacred heart running
back Julius Chestnut and VMI
receiver Jakob herres are among
the Walter Payton Award finalists
highlighting The associated Press
FCs all-america team released on
Wednesday, May 12.
The Championship subdivi-
sion’s spring season, pushed back
nearly six months because of
the pandemic, will conclude on
sunday, May 16, with the national
title game between No. 2-seeded
sam houston and top-seeded south
dakota state in Frisco, Texas.
The two biggest awards in
division I football’s second tier
will be handed out on saturday,
May 15. The Payton award goes
to the player of the year and the
Buck Buchanan award honors the
top defensive player in the FCs.
The AP’s All-America first team
includes five of the 16 Payton award
finalists and 10 of the 18 Buchanan
finalists.
Barriere passed for 2,448 yards
and 19 touchdowns in seven games
for Eastern Washington. The
second-team quarterback was Cole
Kelley from southeastern Louisi-
ana.
Chestnut led FCs in rushing at
171 yards per game. he was joined
in the first team backfield by North
dakota’s Otis Weah, who averaged
7.1 yards per carry.
Eastern Washington quarterback
Eric Barriere passes against Wash-
ington in the first half of an NCAA
college football game in Seattle
on Aug. 31, 2019.
Elaine Thompson/Associated Press, File