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Friday, January 30, 2015.
A tectonic shift is about to strike minor league hockey in the West, and it will have a direct effect on the Idaho Steelheads. The AHL has announced a new Pacific Division that will move five of its franchises into California, three of them into cities that currently house ECHL teams. The Ontario Reign, Bakersfield Condors and Stockton Thunder are poised to move up a level next season. Ontario will be affiliated with the L.A. Kings, Bakersfield with the Edmonton Oilers and Stockton with the Calgary Flames. In addition, the San Jose Sharks will set up an AHL team in their home arena, and the Anaheim Ducks will have an affiliate in San Diego. It’s too bad Seattle doesn’t have an NHL franchise yet—the Steelheads would be a perfect fit as an AHL farm club.
That will leave four teams in the ECHL’s Pacific Division: the Steelheads, Alaska Aces, Utah Grizzlies and Colorado Eagles. The league is scheduled to make a “major announcement” today. What will it do? The ECHL may have to combine the four survivors with at least part of the new Central Division created last October when the Central Hockey League folded and was absorbed into the ECHL. They can just call it the West Division again. Rapid City, anyone? A plus: there will be some new teams coming to CenturyLink Arena next season.
With the AHL shuffling, the Idaho Steelheads’ earth is about to be shaken—even more than it was Wednesday night in a 7-2 blowout loss at Ontario. And that was plenty. The seven goals allowed were a season-high for Idaho. I doubt goalie Olivier Roy has ever yielded three goals inside the first six minutes of a game before. The Steelies and Reign play again tonight and tomorrow night, with first place in the ECHL Pacific Division truly at stake. With Wednesday’s victory, Ontario pulled into a three-way tie for first place with the Steelheads and Colorado.
Football season ticket information is out for Boise State, and the Broncos are trying to mute the effect of perennially late kickoffs by staying put on prices for the second straight year. In fact, the total cost for four sections in the corners of Albertsons Stadium has actually been reduced by $75 per seat. The Washington game that opens the season may be the toughest ticket in program history. Virtually the only way you can see it in person is to have a season ticket in hand or know somebody who does. If there are any single-game tickets available for the return of Coach Pete, Boise State says those will be available only to season ticket holders. The release from the school asks fans for understanding of the need for ESPN and, consequently, those kickoffs times and emphasizes the importance of home-field advantage and the Broncos’ 14-game winning streak on the blue turf.
Friday night games are fine—they always start earlier. And Boise State has another one for 2015, albeit on the road. The Broncos’ first meeting with Virginia has been moved to Friday, September 25, to accommodate ESPN or ESPN2. The BSU-Washington game will end up in a feature weeknight slot on ESPN, either Thurday, September 3, or Friday, September 4. The Broncos’ road game at BYU, currently scheduled for Saturday, September 12, could also move to a Thursday or Friday. That would leave the Idaho State game at Albertsons Stadium as the only Saturday date in September. Hopefully it stays there, and (gasp) kicks off in the afternoon.
Here’s LeGarrette Blount in the Super Bowl five years after punching out Boise State’s Byron Hout following Oregon’s loss on the blue turf. Blount was the star of New England’s rout of Indianapolis in the AFC Championship Game and is key Sunday against the Seahawks. Obviously the Patriots, who brought him back aboard late in the season, have figured out how to put up with Blount. But a lot of teams haven’t. As Tiki Barber recently said on CBS Sports Radio, “He smoked his way out of Pittsburgh.” A story in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette said one Steelers player called him a “cancer” in the locker room. Blount was cut by the Steelers November 18 for leaving the field before their game was finished against Tennessee the night before.
Boise State will reach the halfway point of the Mountain West basketball schedule next Tuesday night at Utah State, and the conference race couldn’t be more wide open. Two teams, Wyoming and San Diego State, are 6-2, and five more, including Boise State are 5-3. Incredibly, that’s seven teams within a game of first place, keeping in mind that only six of them will get byes in the first round of the Mountain West Tournament. The Aggies have one game before the Broncos come to Logan, and it’s the feature game in the conference tomorrow night. In this, Stew Morrill’s final season as coach, don’t put it past USU to get it done at San Diego State.
Boise State’s five-game conference winning streak in basketball is its longest of the Mountain West era. The Broncos kept it going Tuesday in an interesting way, and they’ll try to do the same thing next Tuesday at Utah State. Ten times in the last two seasons Boise State has dropped the first game of a conference series. The Broncos are 8-2 in rematches of those losses after winning the first return game of this winter versus Colorado State. They went 4-1 in second meetings after losses in 2012-13 and 3-1 in 2013-14.
Around the hoops horn: If the Idaho Stampede had trouble with the Austin Spurs at home Tuesday, what will happen on the road? The reeling Stampede now visit the Texas capital for games against the D-League Southwest Division leaders tonight and tomorrow night. The Idaho men play their second game of the season against one of the Big Sky’s best tomorrow night at Eastern Washington. Should be entertaining—the Eagles and Vandals are the two top-scoring teams in the conference. And the College of Idaho men, now ranked No. 3 in NAIA Division II, play at Concordia tonight and Warner Pacific tomorrow night. Tonight’s contest has been tabbed as another NAIA National Game of the Week.
Graham DeLaet has three second-place finishes in his PGA Tour career, and one of them was at the Phoenix Open last year. He does not yet have a tour victory. Playing in the same group with former Boise State teammate Troy Merritt, DeLaet felt right at home in the Desert yesterday, shooting a four-under 67. He’s tied for ninth after the Phoenix Open’s first round, just three shots off the lead. Merritt came in at even-par 70 and is tied for 64th. He’ll need a solid round today. He’ll be urged on by DeLaet, as the two Meridian residents will be playing together again today.
What’s a sure sign of our inversion days coming to an end? The start of the college baseball season, even if it isn’t in the Treasure Valley. The College of Idaho begins its 2015 campaign with doubleheaders at Cal State Dominguez Hills on Sunday and Monday. The Coyotes return the bulk of their squad this season and boast 29 home games at Wolfe Field. This will be Shawn Humberger’s 28th year in the Yotes program and his 15th as head coach. Also on the campus beat, the Boise State gymnastics team, coming off its best January score ever, faces rival Utah State tonight in Logan. And the Bronco men’s tennis team visits Pepperdine Sunday after falling 4-2 to the Waves last Saturday in the ITA Kickoff at UCLA.
This Day In Sports…brought to you by ZAMZOW’S…nobody knows like Zamzow’s!
January 30, 1996: Magic Johnson returns to the Los Angeles Lakers lineup for his first regular-season appearance since his November, 1991, announcement that he had tested positive for HIV. Johnson was 36 years old by then—and 30 pounds heavier—but he played 27 minutes, contributing 19 points, eight rebounds and 10 assists in a 128-118 win over the Golden State Warriors. Johnson appeared in 32 games for the Lakers that season before retiring for the final time.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment Sunday nights at 10:30PM on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors five sports segments each weekday on 93.1 The Ticket. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
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