Full field of unlimited hydroplanes are set to invade Tri-Cities for spring training event

Don’t know if anyone keeps these kind of records, but the eight unlimited hydroplanes expected to be in Lampson Pits on Friday has to be an all-time high for what has become the annual Spring Training day in the Tri-Cities.

Throw in four vintage hydroplanes and a number of Grand Prix boats, and action out on the Columbia River looks to be non-stop as teams get the kinks out of their vessels.

The first boats are expected to hit the water at 9 a.m., and usually action is over around 2 p.m.

Team owners, crew chiefs and drivers always love this chance to get the chance to run their systems before that first race of the year — which is the Southern Cup in Guntersville, Ala., on June 24-25.

As one team owner told me, rather than spending that first race constantly adjusting their setups, they can get that done at Spring Training.

With just five races again on the 2023 H1 Unlimited circuit, points will be very important for the national championship — especially from the get-go.

So who’s here? It might be easier to ask who isn’t here, which looks to be only the U-3 Cooper’s team.

The lineup for Friday, though, is as follows:

▪ The U-1 Miss HomeStreet with new driver Dylan Runne, who replaces the retired Jimmy Shane;

▪ The U-8 Beacon Electric and driver J. Michael Kelly. One of the two Strong Racing boats owned by the Tri-Cities own Darrell and Vanessa Strong.

▪ The U-9 Beacon Plumbing and driver Corey Peabody. This boat, owned by the Strongs, has been completely rebuilt after Peabody flipped in Madison, Ind., last season.

▪ U-11 Legend Yacht Transport, with driver Jamie Nilsen. Boat is owned by Scott and Shannon Raney, and Nilsen has been their driver for the past few years.

▪ U-21 Miss Lakeridge Paving, with driver Gunnar O’Farrell. The boat is owned by Greg and Brian O’Farrell, who brought the team here last year for Spring Training. Greg is Gunnar’s grandfather, while Brian is Gunnar’s father. Greg had said at last year’s event if his health was better, they’d race in 2022. But it didn’t improve, and the boat was drydocked all year.

▪ U-40 Bucket List Racing, and driver Dustin Echols. Owner Kelly Stocklin parted ways with driver Dave Villwock after Seafair last year, bringing Echols — who had been driving the 440 in previous season — back for the San Diego race. Now Echols gets the cockpit.

▪ U-91 Goodman Real Estate, with driver Andrew Tate. The older Miss Madison boat can still move fast. Now throw in one of the sport’s better drivers in Tate — who didn’t drive an unlimited last season when the Graham Trucking didn’t run — and this boat could be a darkhorse for the title.

▪ 440 Boitano Homes, and driver Brent Hall. The 440 was drydocked all last season, as Stocklin put all of his team’s sources into the U-40 for a run at the season championship. Well, Stocklin has brought it back for at least the Tri-Cities and Seattle races. And Hall, a long-time driver, gets his first chance at racing an unlimited.

The Columbia Cup is scheduled for July 28-30 in the Tri-Cities.

Other races are the Madison Regatta on June 30-July 2; Seattle will have the APBA Gold Cup on Aug. 4-6; and the San Diego Bayfair will be run Sept. 15-17.

Junior hockey

The Seattle Thunderbirds have advanced to the Memorial Cup semifinals after going 2-1 in the round-robin portion of play this past week in Kamloops, British Columbia.

The T-Birds ended up winning the Western Hockey League title by beating the Winnipeg Ice 4 games to 1. Before that, Seattle had won the Western Conference championship by beating the Kamloops Blazers 4 games to 2.

So the Thunderbirds qualified for the Memorial Cup as the Western Hockey League champion.

They beat the Peterborough Petes 6-3, lost to the Quebec Remparts 3-1, and beat Memorial Cup host Kamloops 6-1 in round-robin play.

Here’s the remaining schedule of play: at 6 p.m., Thursday, June 1, Peterborough (Ontario Hockey League champ) plays Kamloops in a tiebreaker; the winner then meets Seattle at 7 p.m., Friday, in a semifinal; the winner of that takes on Quebec (Quebec Major Junior Hockey League champ) at 4 p.m. Sunday in the Memorial Cup final.

Softball

Congrats goes out to Othello softball coach Rudy Ochoa, whose Huskies placed third at the 2A state softball tournament last weekend in Selah.

Ochoa announced his retirement at the end of this season, and the Huskies players would have liked nothing better than to give him a championship.

Alas, that went by the wayside in the first round, as No. 12 seed Olympic upset the fifth-seeded Huskies 11-3.

But Ochoa’s players gathered themselves after that and went on a winning streak of five games: edging Selah 8-7, topping Sedro Woolley 11-10, outscoring Cedarcrest 9-7, stopping Enumclaw 5-2; and finally beating Aberdeen 8-2 for the third-place trophy.

Othello finished the season with a 23-6 record.

Top seed North Kitsap beat No. 3 Ridgefield 8-1 in the 2A title game.

Women’s basketball

Three Mid-Columbians were named to the Frontier Conference’s All-Academic women’s basketball team recently — all three playing for the University of Providence in Montana.

Players making the team have to at least be a sophomore and carry at least a 3.25 grade point average.

Senior Kenedy Cartwright (Chiawana), who majors in Elementary Education; grad student Alicia Oatis (Kennewick) an Organizational Leadership major; and junior Delaney Pink (Chiawana), an Elementary Education major; all made the squad.

Jeff Morrow is former sports editor for the Herald.