Sandy Campbell died peacefully on May 11, 2025, at age 73, surrounded by family. Born in Winnipeg and raised in Brandon, Manitoba, by Alice and Bill Campbell, he cherished his prairie upbringing. In 1969, Sandy moved to California, drawn by the Summer of Love. He later lived in Vancouver and Sechelt, BC, before settling in Santa Barbara, where he ran Chapala Gardens and was active in the beach volleyball and Bridge communities. Sandy lived with curiosity, creativity, and warmth. A gentle giant in spirit and stature, he was a loving father who offered his children unconditional support, a devoted husband, and a loyal friend known for his kindness, quick wit, and generosity.
He is survived by his adoring wife, Joy Kelly; children Alex, Jake, and Charlotte; and grandchildren Jameson, Rory, and Skylar. He will be deeply missed by all who knew him.
A memorial will be held on June 1. For more information, please visit www.online-tribute.com/SandyCampbell
In lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Organic Soup Kitchen in Santa Barbara.

PROVO, Utah — BYU women’s volleyball head coach Heather Olmstead has announced the signing of transfer libero Emma Barbero.

A 5-foot-7 junior from Asti, Italy, Barbero will come two Provo after two seasons at Washington State, where she helped the Cougars to a Sweet 16 appearance in 2023 and trip to the NIVC last year.

Barbero led Wazzu in digs (430) last season while also posting the team’s second-most aces (31) and third-most assists (141). She finished with a career-high 27 digs at Omaha and tallied a career-high six aces against former WCC foe San Francisco.

Named to the 2024 CSC Academic All-District Team and WCC All-Academic Team, Barbero is a microbiology major. Prior to her time on the Palouse, she helped Italy to a runner-up finish at the 2021 U18 FIVB World Championships where she was also named the tournament’s Best Libero.

Barbero will join Anna Blamires, Suli Davis, Grace Fredrick and Kaylee Tingey as the fifth member of the Cougars’ 2025 signing class this summer.

To help my son conquer a fear — riding across a long dirt path near a lake during our Sunday bike ride — I bribed my son by telling him I’d get him some Pokémon cards if he did it. After the ride, we look for said Pokémon cards, which apparently are impossible to find in local stores. So, we ended up getting him two packs of baseball cards. He was hopeful to get an autographed card, which I told him was a low-percentage chance. I’ve personally never opened a pack with an autographed card. Low and behold, he did get an autographed card and was excited. He showed it to me. The player was Janson Junk. At first, I did not think this was a real player. It should like a name from the video game, “Ken Griffey Jr. Presents Major League Baseball.” Alas, Janson Junk is a real player who has appeared in 15 games from 2021-24, posting a 6.75 ERA with three teams. I would have rather had a generic card of a mid-level player. But if you anybody wants a Janson Junk autographed card, I’m your guy.

Onto this week’s Monday Mailbag. Thanks, as always, for the questions.

Here are the top-10 sports I’d like to see the Nevada Wolf Pack add, knowing full well none of these are likely to happen due to the increased expenses associated with adding sports.

10. Women’s triathlon: This is listed as an “emerging” sport that is not full-fledged Division I, although Reno-Tahoe’s location would be perfect for Nevada to get on the triathlon train.

9. Men’s lacrosse: This is mostly an East Coast sport, but Denver, for example, added this sport in 1999, put money into it and has reached six Final Fours since 2011, including the 2015 national title.

8. Men’s swimming and diving: Despite having an excellent women’s swimming and diving program, Nevada has never had a men’s swimming and diving program. UNLV does sponsor that sport.

7. Men’s wrestling: The Wolf Pack has no history in wrestling, but it is a popular sport in Northern Nevada with the Pac-12 having a wrestling conference Nevada could join.

6. Rifle: Nevada had a rifle program until it was cut in 2018 while cross country was added. It’s a low-expense sport that shouldn’t have been cut in the first place.

5. Men’s soccer: Nevada started a women’s soccer program in 2000 and has had almost no success. But if the Wolf Pack got a soccer-only stadium built, adding a men’s team (UNLV has one) would be great.

4. Women’s gymnastics: Gymnastics is popular in Nevada with the MW adding it as a sport in 2024. The conference will lose two members in 2026 (Boise State, Utah State), so Nevada adding gymnastics would help. Hire two-time Olympian Jake Dalton to run the program.

3. Men’s track and field: Nevada had an elite cross country/track and field program until the programs were cut in a Title IX move in 1994. Men’s cross country returned in 2019. Neither UNLV nor Nevada has a men’s track program.

2. Women’s beach volleyball: I’ve long felt this would be a good fit with a potential NCAA Championship at Sand Harbor. All four incoming MW schools (Grand Canyon, UC Davis, Hawaii, UTEP) have beach volleyball, as does retained member SJSU.

1. Men’s hockey: Nevada added a club hockey team this season, has some boosters with drive and capital helping run the program and the incoming hockey-ready GSR Arena (Reno Ice also could be used). This is an expensive sport (at least a $1.1 million annual budget), but things are lining up for this to at least be a possibility. I would still guess it’s more unlikely to happen than likely to happen in the next decade, but there’s now an actual chance.

I wouldn’t rule it out, but the cost of doing business at the Division I level is getting higher and higher, so I would guess Nevada State University does not make the jump to D-I in the next 25 years. It would be nice to see one of the junior colleges in Nevada — CSN, NSU, TMCC, WNC, GBC — add a football program.

If we’re limiting ourselves to the 2024-25 Wolf Pack athletic season, here would be my top-10 stories:

HM. Angels finish second in Washoe Little League’s Triple-A regular season (only team to beat the Diamondbacks); playoffs looming

10. Nevada women’s tennis nearly wins Mountain West

9. $5 million Reno-Tahoe Indoor track opens

8. Nevada athletics approved for student fee to build indoor FieldHouse

7. Wolf Pack football loses 10 games for third straight season

6. Nevada men’s basketball underachieves in 17-16 season

5. Wolf Pack volleyball’s SJSU boycott goes national

4. Nevada baseball wins Mountain West regular-season title

3. Nevada softball snap’s Wolf Pack’s three-year title drought

2. GSR Arena passed, ready to broke ground

1. Pac-12, Mountain West realignment

This isn’t going to happen, but I would implode Lawlor Events Center and put money into the Virginia Street Gym to make that the home of Nevada women’s basketball and volleyball. VSG holds 1,800 fans, which is not the ideal size for a women’s basketball program, but UNLV women’s basketball plays at Cox Pavilion (capacity 2,454). VSG would be a much better environment for women’s basketball games than Lawlor. And Nevada could play 50 percent of its games there and 50 percent at GSR Arena. But if I was on the city council that approved GSR Arena’s approval, I also would have wanted an agreed-upon lease between the GSR and Wolf Pack with a minimum number of women’s basketball games at the GSR Arena (let’s say four) was part of the deal. GSR owner Alex Meruelo said during the approval meeting that he loves women’s basketball and wants them to play games in the arena. I would have gotten that in writing. There’s a reason the team wasn’t included. But a combo between an upgraded VSG and the state-of-the-art GSR would be nice. And then Lawlor’s land gets turned into a new dorm or something. The indoor fieldhouse already has a home between Mackay Stadium and Wolf Pack Park.

I wrote more extensively about it in last week’s Monday Mailbag, but it should get approval from the Nevada Board of Regents soon (probably June’s meeting) and break ground shortly thereafter.

In April, I wrote a story titled, “Did Oregon State, Washington State build a Pac-12 they’re not good enough to compete in?” That ended up being the most-read story in NevadaSportsNet.com’s history with a lot of angry Beavers and Cougars. But the results are the results. Those two schools were mid-level (at best) while competing in the Mountain West and West Coast Conference this season. And that’s despite getting Pac-12 revenue this year, and having the advantage of Pac-12 revenue for multiple decades previously. Now that they money is going to be even, I don’t see Oregon State or Washington State being superpowers in the new Pac-12. They’re MW-level schools that didn’t want to join the MW and built a conference it’s not going to be super competitive in.

(Also, Washington State will be in the MW in baseball next season, too, so it’s not the Cougars’ one and only season in the league.)

Yes, this is the first season Nevada baseball and softball won a regular-season title in the same season. And the only way a Mountain West baseball team get into the NCAA Tournament is by winning this week’s conference tournament. No MW team has an at-large case. This will be a one-bid MW yet again (the last time MW baseball got two teams in the NCAA Tournament was 2014). The top RPI in the league this season is Fresno State at 124; Nevada is 152. You need a top-40 RPI to have any shot of an at-large bid out of a mid-major conference.

There’s been some recruiting adjustment as Nevada added NAIA (Kaleb Lowery) and junior-college (Vaughn Weems) players in addition to plenty of Division I transfers (Elijah Price, Tayshawn Comer, Corey Camper Jr., Joel Armotrading). The Wolf Pack had to add a full rotation of players this offseason with just one for-sure returning rotation player in Tyler Rolison, so it had to spread out its NIL money differently than years past when it had a base of returning talent. Price was a big-name addition who could have gone to a power conference. That was about it. I saw the Wolf Pack’s name attached to plenty of bigger names, but the NIL landscape continues to get richer at the top end, meaning Nevada can’t afford those players. The Wolf Pack landed most of the players it hosted on official visits out of the transfer portal, so it mostly got its guys.

I imagine Nevada has a much bigger NIL budget than James Madison, which is where former Wolf Pack player Justin McBride landed last week. Here’s a feature story on JMU’s approach to NIL from a year ago.

The Pac-12 could go the waiver route, but I think it will add Texas State as the eighth member at some point. It’s the only realistic option.

Nevada infielder Junhyuk Kwon sprained his calf running out a groundout in the first game of the Wolf Pack’s series against Fresno State three weeks ago. He hasn’t played since then, and it appeared as if he was trending toward playing this week but won’t be available for Nevada at the Mountain West Tournament. He leads Nevada in average (.346) with eight homers, 11 doubles and a 1.012 OPS, so that’s a big loss. He could be available if the Wolf Pack makes an NCAA Regional.

The Giants are responsible for the A’s moving to Las Vegas since they blocked the team’s move to San Jose using their territorial rights. The Giants only got those rights with the A’s blessing. Former San Jose mayor Sam Liccardo once said, “If it were not for the Giants’ vehement and combative opposition a decade ago, I have zero doubt — and I share this view with many people most deeply engaged in bringing an MLB team to San Jose — that the A’s would be playing in downtown San Jose today in a stadium built at no taxpayer expense. The Giants hired and paid attorneys to sue the city, they organized an opposition group, and most importantly, they pressured the commissioner to keep San Jose a minor-league baseball city.” Baseball would be better off with two teams in the Bay Area and an expansion franchise in Las Vegas (if a team must be in the city). The Giants stood in the way of that because the team didn’t want the A’s 50 miles away in San Jose.

Three biggest positive surprises (teams): 1. Giants, 2. Tigers, 3. Mariners (offense mostly)

Three biggest negative surprises (teams): 1. Orioles, 2. Rockies (no team should be this bad), 3. Red Sox

Three biggest positive surprises (players): 1. Cubs OF Pete Crow-Armstrong, 2. Royals LHP Kris Bubic, 3. Dodgers OF Andy Pages

Three biggest negative surprises (teams): 1. Rangers 2B Marcus Semien, 2. Dodgers OF Michael Conforto, 3. Blue Jays OF Anthony Santander

World Series prediction: Giants over Yankees (4-0); the Giants will not lose a game in the playoffs (a perfect 11-0)

A Canadian team winning the Stanley Cup would be the better story. That’s their national sport, and that hasn’t happened since the Montreal Canadiens won in 1993. All hopes are pinned on the Edmonton Oilers.

I’m pretty simple — mustard, ketchup and relish. I’ll do diced onions, if available. And I’m fine without ketchup, as I know people have issues with that. I’ll also go the Sonic the Hedgehog route with chili and cheese. But it’s a minimal gussing up for me. Nothing too crazy.

See y’all in two weeks! (No Mailbag next Monday as we’ll celebrate Memorial Day, potentially with hot dogs!)

Sports columnist Chris Murray provides insight on Northern Nevada sports. He writes a weekly Monday Mailbag despite it giving him a headache and it taking several hours to write. But people seem to like it, so he does it anyway. Contact him at crmurray@sbgtv.com or follow him on Twitter @ByChrisMurray.

NEW ORLEANS – The Augustana track and field teams were recognized with five athletes dubbed USTFCCCA All-Region Performers for the 2025 NCAA Division II Outdoor Track and Field season, officials announced.
 
The top-five individuals in each event from each region earn All-Region distinction, in addition to each member of the region’s top-three relay teams. The regions used for this award—Atlantic, Central, East, Midwest, South, South Central, Southeast and West—match those used during the cross country season.
 
VIKING MEN
Ryan Hartman – 1500-meter run, 5000-meter run
Andrew Martens – 110-meter hurdles
 
VIKING WOMEN
Ella Bakken – 5000-meter run
Bryn Greenwaldt – high jump
Kylee Sallee – long jump
 

–GoAugie.com–

May 19, 2025 — Wyo4News

Today, it was announced that the University of Wyoming Athletics has agreed to a multi-year extension with Cowgirl Volleyball Head Coach Kaylee Prigge. The extension runs through the 2027 season.

“I am eternally grateful to love what I do and who I do it with,” said Prigge, who has led the Cowgirls to 39 victories in her two seasons at the helm. That success has led UW volleyball to receive back-to-back national postseason appearances in the NIVC, where the team advanced to the Great Eight Round each season.

“Our future is bright, and that is because of the group of young women that make up Cowgirl Volleyball. Their commitment to the development and growth of our program is what I am most proud of and excited to continue. GO POKES,” added Prigge.

“We are thrilled to have the opportunity to continue growing and building Wyoming Volleyball for this community and the state of Wyoming,” added Prigge. “I want to thank Tom Burman, Taylor Stuemky, and our entire administration for their support of the program and trust in our staff. Our athletics department is special because of the high-level commitment to every UW team. We truly are one state, one university, and one team.”