NW Briefs | Yakama Sun Kings are shut down

YAKIMA — The Yakama Indian Nation has shut down operations of its Continental Basketball Association team, the Yakama Sun Kings.

Team officials were clearing out their offices Thursday morning. Head coach and general manager Paul Woolpert says they were informed of the decision Friday.

The Sun Kings have experienced great success on the court in recent years. A two-year reign as CBA champions was snapped this year when the team lost early in the playoffs, but the Sun Kings still set a league mark for winning percentage with a 43-5 record.

The league also honored Woolpert with coach of the year honors for the second consecutive season.

The tribe's decision comes despite the fact that it had one year left on a three-year operating commitment made after its first season of ownership (2005-06).

"It's wrong," Virgil Lewis, a former Tribal Council member, told the Yakima Herald-Republic. "There was a motion passed [in 2006] ... for this franchise to operate for three [more] seasons, and that isn't being honored.

"It makes the tribe look bad. It puts the tribe in a very bad light."

There were reports the tribe was attempting to sell the team.

The decision was made by the 14-member Tribal Council, but there was a chance the decision could be overturned, Lewis said.

Baseball

Starting pitcher Nick Haughian struck out 14 over his eight innings and Kyle Conley hit another late tiebreaking homer to lead the Washington baseball team to a 5-1 win over Brigham Young at Husky Ballpark in the first of a three-game series. Haughian (4-2) allowed one run on five hits, walking two, for the Huskies (22-9). For BYU (14-19), Jordan Muir (2-3) held the Huskies scoreless until the eighth inning.

Softball

Central Washington's Liz Wallace combined to go 3 for 6 with a run batted in, but the Wildcats (14-20 overall, 9-5 Great Northwest Athletic Conference) were outhit 24-11 in the two games of their softball doubleheader, falling twice to visiting Montana State Billings, 11-1 and 4-3. Montana State Billings (17-16, 6-4) has won 11 of its last 12 games.

Golf

The Eastern Washington finished with a 317 to place third in the one-round Big Sky Preview at the Foothills Golf Club in Phoenix, Ariz.

Tennis

The Gonzaga women defeated host Eastern Washington 7-0.

Notes

WSU's Kyle Schauble is in second place in the decathlon at the Rafer Johnson/Jackie Joyner-Kersee Invite at UCLA's Drake Stadium.

• The visiting eighth-ranked Washington women's varsity eight will attempt to beat fourth-ranked Washington for an unprecedented third straight year Saturday in the Apple Cup Regatta. The race is set for 9:30 a.m. and is the fourth event on an 11-race card. All races end in the Montlake Cut.

The Huskies women were the surprise winners last Sunday in the San Diego Crew Classic, and the Cougars were third.

The UW men's varsity, which is unanimously ranked No. 1 in the national poll after its victory in San Diego, is idle this week because men's rowing isn't an intercollegiate sport at WSU.

• Emily Silver of Bainbridge Island advanced to today's 100-meter freestyle final at the FINA Short Course World Swimming Championships in Manchester, England. She qualified eighth in 53.85.

Compiled from wire services and sports-information reports.