Oregon
100 greatest girls athletes in Oregon high school sports history (Part 4)
On Feb. 3, 1987, President Ronald Reagan signed Proclamation 5606, declaring Feb. 4, 1987, National Women in Sports Day.
Every year since, National Girls and Women in Sports Day (NGWSD) celebrates female athletes’ accomplishments and honors the progress women in sports have made toward equality in participation and access.
Wednesday, Feb. 4, was the 40th NGWSD.
A year ago, longtime high school sports writer René Ferrán unveiled for High School On SI a list of the 50 greatest girls athletes in Oregon high school sports history.
Headed up by St. Mary’s Academy legend Anna Maria Lopez through No. 50 Ashley Smith of Oregon City, the list celebrated the rich history of the state’s top female athletes on the 39th anniversary of the creation of NGWSD.
Now, with NGWSD turning 40 this month, The Oregonian/OregonLive tasked Ferrán with adding to the list another 50 athletes who have made significant contributions to the state’s high school sports scene.
We’ll be counting down all week, continuing today with No. 70 through No. 61. (The year listed beside each name is the year she graduated from high school.)
Let’s celebrate together the best of the best and their many achievements in their favorite sports.
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70. Caroline Inglis, Churchill, 2012 (golf)
Inglis has the distinction of finishing atop the 5A state leaderboard four consecutive years as a high school golfer.
But she did not win four titles. Instead, she lost out in her bid to become the state’s first four-time state champion when she signed an incorrect scoreboard after the final round at Trysting Tree as a senior.
She shot a 3-under 69, which would have secured a nine-stroke win. She mistakenly signed for a 68 after her playing partner recorded a par-4 on the 18th hole rather than the bogey-5 she scored — which under the USGA rules at the time led to her disqualification.
In a cruel twist of fate, her father, Bill, also signed for an incorrect score at the 1971 state tournament, costing South Eugene a chance to win a team trophy.
Inglis had to rally from three shots down as a freshman for her first title, shooting the best round of the tournament — a 4-over 76 — for a two-shot win.
She won by one stroke as a sophomore, finishing as the only golfer under par after two rounds. The next year required another comeback — albeit from only a one-shot deficit — to win by two.
She played collegiately down the road at the University of Oregon, where she won the program’s first Pac-10 individual title in 2015 and led the Ducks to a tie for fifth in the team standings at the NCAA Championships as a senior, when she tied for 16th with an even-par 288 total.
She played nine years on the LPGA Tour, making 124 starts with 17 top-25 finishes, including a tie for ninth at the 2024 Women’s PGA Championship. She retired at the end of the 2025 season in part because of recurring back injuries and took a job with the Oregon Golf Association.
69. Kiana Brown, Triangle Lake, 2014 (basketball, volleyball, track and field)
As Brown approached becoming the state’s all-time basketball scoring leader, she told her father and coach, Chad, that she didn’t want to chase the points.
She just wanted to play.
It turned out she could do both. A couple days after scoring a personal-high 53 points against Mohawk, she made a 3-pointer midway through the second quarter against Siletz Valley to pass Trisha Stevens atop the all-time Oregon list.
Brown kept pouring in points the rest of the season, which ended with the Lakers placing fifth at the 1A state tournament and Brown having scored 2,894 points. She scored 835 points as a senior and 833 as a junior, the second- and third-most points in a season in state history, and she made a state-record 590 free throws in 733 attempts to go with a 1A-record 413 assists.
She was a 1A co-player of the year as a junior and a first-team all-state selection as a senior. She was a second-team all-state selection in volleyball as a sophomore and a district champion in the 200 meters and high jump as a freshman.
Brown played basketball for Eastern Washington, Humboldt State and Portland State, averaging 11.8 points as a redshirt junior for the Vikings in 2017-18 and finishing seventh in the nation in free throw percentage (.898).
68. Haley Vann, Cleveland, 2023 (wrestling)
Growing up, Vann got into jiu-jitsu, which eventually led her to take up wrestling heading into high school.
She placed third at the OSAA state championships as a freshman, when she went 23-4. After suffering an early-season loss during the COVID-19 spring 2021 campaign, she became indestructible, winning 77 consecutive matches to finish as a three-time state champion with a 101-5 record.

“I think after freshman year, I just really started to love the sport,” Vann said after winning title No. 3 with a 10-0 major decision over Forest Grove’s Renae Cook. “I really wanted to get better at it and just like pursue it like I did.”
Vann decided to wrestle for North Central College in Illinois, where as a freshman she placed fifth at 59 kilograms at the U20 Women’s Nationals.
67. Kara Braxton, Westview, 2001 (basketball)
Braxton and her twin sister, Kim, lived in Beaverton as infants before the family moved to Michigan. When their mother, Chris Brown, moved back to the Portland area in the summer of 1998, the fortunes of the Westview program changed.
After considering a move to Oregon City and a chance for them to play for coach Brad Smith (who moved on to Vanderbilt University in the meantime), Brown decided to enroll her girls at Westview after hearing good things about coach Mark Neffendorf.
At Westview, the twins blossomed, with Kara achieving greater success.
She twice was named 4A player of the year and won Gatorade state player of the year honors after her junior season, when she led the Wildcats to their only state championship by averaging 15 points and 8.2 rebounds in four state tournament games. She finished the season averaging a double-double (17.8 points, 10 rebounds) and four blocked shots per game.

Kara and Kim signed with the University of Georgia in the fall of 2000, but their excitement was muted when they had to sit the first three months of their senior season because they were academically ineligible. They ended up playing just six games, with Westview unable to defend its state title by missing the playoffs by one game.
Kara finished with 1,198 points — the first Wildcat to reach the 1,000-point milestone.
At Georgia, Kara was named SEC Freshman of the Year in 2002 and twice earned first-team all-SEC honors before being dismissed from the team because of repeated team rules infractions. The WNBA’s Detroit Shock drafted her No. 7 overall in 2005, and she made the All-Rookie team that summer and the WNBA All-Star team in 2007 during her 10-year career.
66. Amy Nickerson, Coquille, 1999 (track and field, cross country)
Nickerson dominated the middle distances in the late 1990s, becoming the first runner at any classification (boy or girl) to win four state titles in the 800 and 1,500 meters.
She set 3A meet records in both events — she ran the 800 in 2 minutes, 14.09 seconds, as a junior in 1998 and the 1,500 in 4:34.93 as a sophomore in 1997 — that stood until Philomath’s Brianna Anderson-Gregg broke both in 2003.
Nickerson won three cross country state championships, including twice as she battled severe sideaches. A third-place finish as a sophomore denied her of being the first four-time champion.
She ran at the University of Oregon for one year, with her 11th-place showing at the NCAA West Regional Championships pacing the Ducks to a fifth-place finish and a spot at the NCAA Championships, where Nickerson finished 65th.
65. Laura Schott, Jesuit, 1999 (soccer, track and field)
Girls soccer was building statewide in the mid-1990s. Enough schools added the sport to split the state championships into two classifications in 1992, and two years later, Jesuit won the first of its 17 titles.
Two years after that, Schott arrived at the Southwest Portland campus and, as The Oregonian wrote, “took girls soccer to a new level in Oregon high school play.”
During her four seasons in the program, the Crusaders never lost to an in-state opponent — their only defeat was to Washington power Bellarmine Prep of Tacoma during her freshman season — as they went 72-1-4, including back-to-back 19-0 campaigns her junior and senior years. Schott won Gatorade state player of the year honors both seasons.
She scored 116 goals, which put her third on the all-time Oregon list behind Tiffeny Milbrett and Sarah Bagby (she’s since fallen to ninth), and received Parade All-American honors her senior year.
Schott starred at Cal-Berkeley, making the All-Pac-10 first team three times and earning All-American honors as a sophomore, when she tied the school record with 23 goals. She finished as the program’s all-time leader with 56 goals — a record that still stands — and went on to earn five caps with the U.S. national team and play for the Washington Freedom in the WUSA and the California Storm of the WPSL, winning titles with both.
After her playing career, she started a second act as a coach, assisting at Portland State for three years before starting a nine-year term as head coach, winning four Big Sky titles. She joined the Portland Thorns staff in 2017 as the academy director, and she led the George Fox program for six seasons before stepping down in December.
64. Kaitlyn Dobler, Aloha, 2020 (swimming)
There have been four-time state titlists and Olympians who have come through the OSAA swimming championships over the years.
But only one four-time champion and Olympic hopeful also holds a national high school record. Dobler set the mark in the 100-yard breaststroke her senior year at Tualatin Hills Aquatic Center in her final high school race, with her winning time of 58.35 seconds breaking the record by five-hundredths of a second — a record that still stood entering this season.
It was Dobler’s fourth state title in the 100 breast and came after she set a state record in the 50 freestyle — her third title in that event.
After her junior season, she joined Team USA at the World Junior Swimming Championships, swimming a leg on the gold medal-winning 4×100 medley relay and bringing home medals in the 50- (bronze) and 100-meter breaststroke (silver).
Dobler earned All-America status three times in high school before heading to USC, where she was the Pac-12 Freshman Swimmer of the Year and became the first Trojan to win five consecutive conference titles in the same event (the 100 breast) among her 11 career titles. She won NCAA and national championships in the 100 breast her sophomore year.
63. Lisa Gibson, Southridge, 2007 (water polo, swimming)
Gibson was born in Chichester, England, but moved to Beaverton in grade school, beginning to play water polo at age 12 for the Tualatin Hills Water Polo Club.
She played for Southridge in high school, twice earning Metro League MVP honors — including her senior year, when the Skyhawks won the league title with an 11-0-1 record and reached their first (and only) state final, where they lost to Newberg 8-2 amidst the Tigers’ run of five consecutive championships.
At the same time, she was traveling back to England to play for the Great Britain junior team. She debuted for the senior national team at the 2007 European Championships at age 17, and she moved back to England to attend the University of Manchester, where she earned a degree in biomedical sciences while continuing to play for the British national team.
She competed at the London 2012 Olympic Games for the host team, and she played on the World Championships team in 2013. She returned to the Portland area for shoulder surgery and she got into coaching, eventually taking over the Lincoln program in 2014.
62. Jenny Mowe-Joseph, Powers, 1996 (basketball)
Mowe grew up on a 100-acre ranch in a house her parents, Patty and Jerry, built in the small town just outside the Siskiyou National Forest in Southern Oregon, and she took part in all the duties one would expect a farmhand would undertake.
At her tiny high school, considering no one else could match her 6-foot-5 frame, an assistant coach would hold up a broom on which the staff drew a head and added hair and nicknamed Jan the Broom to simulate a defender.
Jan had about as much success stopping Mowe as the overmatched opponents the Cruisers faced during Mowe’s four-year run, which ended with her scoring a then-1A-record 2,187 points, grabbing a still-1A record 1,155 rebounds and leading the team to back-to-back state finals. They won the school’s only title in 1995 during Mowe’s junior year, when she averaged 25 points, 16 rebounds and six blocked shots per game.
As a senior, she averaged 32.5 points in leading Powers back to the state final, where the Cruisers lost to Ione 60-46 (Mowe fouled out), and she earned Gatorade state player of the year honors — the only time a player outside the state’s top two classifications won the award.
She played for the University of Oregon, where she averaged 8.8 points and 5.6 rebounds per game during her five seasons that included a medical redshirt year. Her 222 blocked shots rank third in program history, as does her .573 field goal percentage.
Mowe became the first Ducks player drafted by a WNBA team when she was selected in the second round by the Portland Fire in 2001. She played with the team until it disbanded in 2003; she played two more seasons in China and South Korea before retiring from basketball.
She and her husband, Loran Joseph, moved to Baker City in 2007, where she operates her bakery, Sweet Wife Baking.
61. Kim Hill, Portland Christian, 2008 (volleyball, basketball)
Hill transcended being “just” a 2A wunderkind to become the best volleyball player in the state regardless of classification — just one stop on the road to Olympic stardom.
She made the 2A all-state team all four years with the Royals, earning third-team honors as a freshman before making the first team the next three seasons — including player of the year as a junior and senior.
During her final campaign, she amassed a state-record 952 kills with 137 blocks, 104 digs and 97 aces in leading Portland Christian to a 31-1 record and a second consecutive state title. Her achievements also led to her being named Gatorade state player of the year — the only time in the 30 years of the award that a 2A player won it.
Hill also starred on the hardwood for the Royals, winning 2A player of the year honors as a junior and senior and leading them to the 2007 state championship.
Based on her play at Portland Christian and with the national champion Nike Northwest Junior Air Elite club team, Hill signed with Pepperdine University, where she became the first college player to earn All-American honors in both indoor (2011) and beach (2012-13) volleyball. She played professionally in Poland, Italy and Turkey.
She started her national team career during that time, winning gold at the 2014 World Championships (where she was selected the tournament’s Most Valuable Player), bronze at the 2016 Rio Olympics and gold at the 2021 Tokyo Games, after which she retired from the U.S. National Team.
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The Oregonian/OregonLive will be counting down the state’s 100 greatest girls athletes throughout the week. Check back Friday for Part 5 of the series.
Oregon
Oregon gas prices highest since Sept. 2025 as oil surges on Hormuz disruptions
PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — Crude oil prices surged after U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran and stalled tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, pushing gas prices sharply higher across the country, though Oregon and Washington are seeing smaller increases than many other states.
The national average price for regular gasoline jumped 43 cents over the past week to $3.54 a gallon.
Oregon’s average rose 31 cents to $4.26 a gallon, the 42nd-largest week-over-week increase among states.
Washington also increased 31 cents, ranking 44th-largest.
READ ALSO | Oil prices spike amid Iran war; Oregon gas remains above national average
The current national average is at its highest price since July 2024. Oregon’s average is at its highest since Sept. 2025.
“When crude oil prices shoot up, pump prices follow suit because crude oil is the basic ingredient in gasoline and diesel. It’s impossible to predict how high prices might go, but expect elevated oil and gas prices as long as the conflict in Iran continues and tankers are stalled in the Strait of Hormuz,” said Marie Dodds, public affairs director for AAA Oregon/Idaho.
AAA notes that, in general, every $1 increase in the price of crude oil leads to a 2.4- to 2.5-cent increase in the price of gasoline.
Crude oil typically accounts for about 47% of the cost of a gallon of gasoline, with refining at 16%, distribution and marketing at 20%, and taxes at 17%, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
About 20% of the world’s oil and refined products flow through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow passageway of the Persian Gulf bordered by Iran.
Tankers traveling through the strait carry oil from major producers including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, the UAE, Qatar, Iraq and Iran. Any disruption can affect global oil supplies. While the U.S. does not rely on Iranian oil, China and India do.
Seasonal factors are also adding upward pressure. Gas prices typically rise starting in mid-to-late winter and early spring as refineries undergo maintenance ahead of the switch to summer-blend fuel, which is more expensive to produce and less likely to evaporate in warmer temperatures.
National gas price comparison/AAA chart
Most areas have a May 1 compliance date for refiners and terminals, while most gas stations have a June 1 deadline to switch to selling summer-blend. Some refineries begin maintenance and the switchover in February.
In Oregon, the average price for regular gas began 2026 at $3.42 a gallon. The highest price of the year so far is today’s $4.26, and the lowest was $3.33 on Jan. 20. Nationally, the average began 2026 at $2.83 a gallon. The highest price of the year so far is today’s $3.54, and the lowest was $2.795 on Jan. 11.
AAA reported that U.S. gasoline demand decreased from 8.73 million barrels per day to 8.29 million for the week ending Feb. 27, compared with 8.88 million a year ago.
Total domestic gasoline supply decreased from 254.8 million barrels to 253.1 million. Gasoline production increased last week, averaging 9.3 million barrels per day compared with 9.2 million barrels per day the previous week.
Crude oil prices have been volatile. West Texas Intermediate surged to near four-year highs around $95 per barrel this week but fell to the $80s today as President Trump signaled the conflict with Iran may end soon.
On the West Coast, all seven states remain in the top 10 for the most expensive pump prices nationally.
California has the highest average for the fifth week in a row at $5.29 a gallon and is the only state at or above $5.
Washington is second at $4.69, Hawaii third at $4.59, Nevada fourth at $4.30 and Oregon fifth at $4.26. Arizona averages $3.97 and Alaska $3.95.
All 50 states and the District of Columbia saw week-over-week increases. California had the largest jump at 62 cents, while Hawaii had the smallest at 19 cents. AAA said Oregon and Washington prices also rose last month after an outage of the Olympic pipeline.
The cheapest gas in the nation is in Kansas at $2.96 a gallon and Oklahoma at $3.01. Kansas is the only state with an average in the $2 range this week. The gap between the most expensive and least expensive states is $2.33 this week, up from $2.05 a week ago.
Compared with a month ago, prices are higher everywhere: the national average is up 62 cents and Oregon’s average is up 68 cents.
Compared with a year ago, the national average is up 45 cents and Oregon’s average is up 53 cents.
Diesel prices also spiked. The national average for diesel rose 89 cents over the week to $4.78 a gallon, while Oregon’s average jumped 72 cents to $5.02.
A year ago, the national average for diesel was $3.63 and Oregon’s average was $3.86.
Oregon
Judge in Oregon limits federal officers’ tear gas use at Portland ICE building protests
PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — A federal judge in Oregon on Monday restricted federal officers from using tear gas at protests at the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement building in Portland, in response to a lawsuit filed by the ACLU of Oregon on behalf of protesters and freelance journalists.
U.S. District Judge Michael Simon issued the preliminary injunction after a three-day hearing in which the plaintiffs — including a demonstrator known for wearing a chicken costume, a married couple in their 80s and two freelance journalists — testified about having chemical or projectile munitions used against them.
The lawsuit, whose defendants include the Department of Homeland Security, argues that federal officers’ use of such munitions is a retaliation against protesters that chills their First Amendment rights.
“Plaintiffs provided numerous videos, which were received in evidence and unambiguously show DHS officers spraying OC Spray directly into the faces of peaceful and nonviolent protesters engaged in, at most, passive resistance and discharging tear gas and firing pepper-ball munitions into crowds of peaceful and nonviolent protestors,” Simon wrote, using the term OC Spray to refer to pepper spray.
“Defendants’ conduct — physically harming protestors and journalists without prior dispersal warnings — is objectively chilling.”
DHS did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In previous statements, it said federal officers followed their training and used the minimum amount of force necessary.
Simon had previously issued a temporary restraining order similarly limiting federal agents from using chemical munitions during protests at the ICE building. His preliminary injunction is the second in recent days restricting agents’ tear gas use at the facility, following that of a federal judge overseeing a separate case brought by the residents of an adjacent affordable housing complex.
Federal officers’ aggressive crowd-control tactics are causing concern as demonstrators in cities across the country have protested the immigration enforcement surge spearheaded by President Donald Trump’s administration.
In his Monday order, Simon limited federal agents from using chemical or projectile munitions such as pepper balls and tear gas unless someone poses an imminent threat of physical harm. He also ordered agents not to fire munitions at the head, neck or torso “unless the officer is legally justified in using deadly force against that person.”
Additionally, officers cannot use pepper spray against a group in an indiscriminate way that would affect bystanders; they must only target people who are engaging in violent unlawful conduct or actively resisting arrest, or use it “as reasonably necessary in a defensive capacity,” Simon wrote. He specified that trespassing, refusing to move and refusing to obey an order to disperse are acts of passive, not active, resistance.
Simon also granted provisional class certification, which means his order covers a broader group of all those who have peacefully protested or reported on demonstrations at the ICE building in recent months.
The preliminary injunction will remain in effect while the lawsuit proceeds.
Oregon
Oil prices spike amid Iran war; Oregon gas remains above national average
PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — Oil prices continue to soar Monday as the war in Iran shows no signs of slowing down. Oregon’s gas prices are above the national average.
Production and shipping in the Middle East have been jeopardized by the conflict, pummeling financial markets.
The Associated Press reported that the price for a barrel of Brent crude surged to $119 on Monday. That’s the highest level it’s been since the summer after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Brent crude is the international standard.
RELATED| High oil prices won’t limit Trump’s actions in Iran war: Hegseth
The prices fell to just under $100 later Monday, but barrels are still 36% more expensive than they were before Israel and the United States attacked Iran on Feb. 28.
Today’s AAA national average is $3.478, whereas Oregon’s current average across the state is $4.205.
SEE ALSO | New video shows US Tomahawk hit Iranian Naval Base near school
The average in Oregon just a year ago was 3.730, demonstrating a 12% increase since then.
Still, Washington State’s current average remains higher than Oregon’s, at $4.630.
Malheur County in Oregon currently has the cheapest gas price at $3.499, while Josephine has the more expensive at $4.447.
AAA suggests maintaining cars to the manufacturer’s recommendations can help save fuel. The agency also recommends slowing down and driving the speed limit, avoiding “jackrabbit” starts and hard accelerations and avoiding extended idling to warm up the engine, in winter and even prolonged idling in general.
Research by AAA has shown that premium fuel provides no added benefit unless it is recommended or required by the car’s manufacturer.
Vice President and Global Head of crude oil research at at S&P Global Energy Jim Burkhard said in an analysis on Monday that, at first, the crisis was a transportation issue, “which could conceivably be resolved quickly.”
However, he explained that production and storage concerns are increasingly piling up and restoration “will be a massive technical exercise that could last weeks or more.”
Energy experts’ opinions are clashing, as some warn the war could contribute to even higher oil prices in the near future. In particular, if the Strait of Hormuz remains closed for only a few weeks, oil and gas strategists at Macquarie Research said the price of crude could push to a $150 per barrel or higher. Such prices would top previous peaks of nearly $147, which were reached just before the 2008 financial crisis.
Others, however, don’t expect the disruptions to last much longer. Oxford Economics researchers predict prices will soon fall to an average of $80 a barrel for the quarter, but noted today that the “risk of a more prolonged crisis has clearly increased.”
Iran exports roughly 1.6 million barrels of oil a day, mostly to China, which has called for an immediate end to the fighting.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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