Sports capsules PCYB FIFTH-GRADE TEAM WINS TOMAH TOURNEY: The Portage County Youth Basketball (PCYB) Hoyas fifth-grade traveling team won all four games last weekend at a basketball tournament in Tomah to take first place. The Hoyas beat Mauston, Wisconsin Rapids, Tomah and Alma Center. Team members include John Koehl, Kelvin Stroik, Alex Charles, David Jadack, Tommy Schmitt, Eric Martin, Andy Rice, Josef Wojciehoski, Brandon Mendyke and David Hansel. The team plays again Saturday, Jan. 17, at Stevens Point Area Senior High School (SPASH). * * * POINTER SOFTBALL TEAM OFFERS CLINICS: The University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point (UW-SP) women's softball team will offer 2004 winter clinics. Sessions will be held every Sunday in February - Feb. 1, 8, 15, 22 and 29 - at the university Multi-Activity Center. Session I is for grades 3-7 and will be held from 9 to 11 a.m., with registration at 8:30 a.m. Session II is for grades 8-12 and will be held from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. The cost for five two-hour sessions is $100. For those who can't make all five sessions, the charge is $25 per session. The fee includes instruction and a Pointer T-shirt. The camp will be led by first-year head coach Kelly Erickson, a recent UW-SP graduate. Erickson was a four-year starter at second base and set a single-season record with 64 hits during the 1998 National Championship season. She ranks in the top five all-time in 16 different UW-SP offensive categories. Assistant coaches and current Pointer players will assist her. In the last 10 years, the Pointer softball team has a 265-121 record, earned five first-place finishes in the WIAC Conference, made four NCAA regional tournament appearances, played in two NCAA World Series and won one national championship. For more information, contact Erickson at 346-4277 or e-mail her at kerickson@uwsp.edu. * * * MCCARVILLE PASSES 1,000 POINT MARK: Janel McCarville, a SPASH graduate, became the 14th player in University of Minnesota history to score 1,000 points or more on Sunday, Jan. 11, against the University of Iowa. McCarville, who is known as "Shaq," finished the game with 15 points and had 1,002. She was named to the All-State First Team in her senior year at SPASH, leading the Panthers to the championship game, which they dropped to Janesville Parker. * * * POINTER PLAYERS OF THE WEEK: The UW-SP has announced the players of the week for the teams during the week ending Jan. 12. Men's basketball: Brian Bauer of Auburndale provided a spark off the bench for the Pointers in a pair of games last week. For the week, Bauer was eight-for-12 from the field, including two-for-five from the three-point line. He had five rebounds, two assists, two steals and no turnovers. Women's basketball: Andrea Kraemer notched her second 20-point game and her second double-double of the season in two games this week. Kraemer was 11-for-25 from the field, five-for-eight on free throws, had six assists and five steals. Men's hockey: James Jernberg scored a goal and assisted on another in the Pointers 4-2 victory over Milwaukee School of Engineering on Friday night. Women's hockey: Amy Statz played in net every minute of every game as the Pointers played four ranked opponents in a span of five days. Statz recorded a pair of ties against the top two teams in the country, making 25 saves over first-ranked Elmira College in a 2-2 game, and 24 saves in a 1-1 game against second-ranked Plattsburgh State. For the trip, Statz made 90 saves and allowed just seven goals for a .922 save percentage. Wrestling: Cody Koenig ran his season record to 18-1 with a victory in a dual match against top-ranked Wartburg College in Stevens Point on Saturday. Koenig defeated Nathan Specht of the Knights with a 12-4 major decision. Koenig is currently ranked third in the country at 174 pounds. * * * BASKETBALL TEAMS DROP TO SIXTH IN NATIONAL RANKINGS: After each suffering their first losses of the season last week, the UW-SP men's and women's basketball teams both dropped to sixth in this week's NCAA Division III rankings by D3hoops.com. The top-ranked men's team, Williams (Mass.), also lost last week as Hampden-Sydney (Va.) took over the top spot. The women's team earned its first-ever regular season No. 1 ranking last week and lost to UW-Platteville 78-61. Rochester (N.Y.) took over the top spot in this week's poll. * * * STATZ NAMED NCHA WOMEN'S HOCKEY PLAYER OF THE WEEK: UW-SP women's hockey goalie Amy Statz has been named the Northern Collegiate Hockey Association Player of the Week after playing all 250 minutes of the team's East Coast trip last week. Statz, a Wisconsin Rapids native, allowed just seven goals as the Pointers went 1-1-2 against four nationally ranked squads. She finished with 90 saves for the week. * * * BENNETT RECORDS QUICK START: Dick Bennett, the former basketball coach at UW-SP:UW-Green Bay and UW-Madison, has jumped off to a quick start for the Washington State University (WSU) Cougars. He became the first WSU coach to begin his Cougar career 2-0 since 1983-84. WSU also won six of its first eight games, marking its best start since 1996-97 when the Cougars opened 7-1. The team is 8-6 and 2-2 in Pacific Athletic Conference (PAC) where it was picked to finish ninth. With a 55-50 win at California on Jan. 4, WSU broke a 22-game PAC losing streak on the road, dating back to Feb. 8, 2001. That win was only the second Pac-10 road win in WSU's last 54 outings, dating back to 1997-98. The Cougars also have three road wins in a season for the first time since 1997-98, and broke a 27-game road losing streak on Nov. 22 with the 57-51 win at Alaska Fairbanks. With its eight wins this season, WSU already has won more than in the two previous seasons and is experiencing its best conference start in seven years.