Bears sweep Hawks in IEL match

MOSCOW - Morgan Landers had four kills for the Lakeland Hawks, which fell in a 4A Inland Empire League volleyball match 25-18, 25-19, 25-17 to the Moscow Bears on Wednesday night at Bear Den.

"We were very sluggish and struggled to get an offense going," Lakeland assistant coach Alyana Watson said. "From that, we couldn't pass the ball and get anything started."

Haley Rotchford had three aces for Lakeland (1-1), which travels to Coeur d'Alene on Friday.

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"That played a little bit into it," Shawn Amos said. "But we just need to come out ready to roll."

Coeur d'Alene can scout its next opponent in person. Skyline, the defending Washington 4A champ, plays Bellevue (Wash.), the reigning 3A champion, right after Coeur d'Alene's game, at 7 p.m. at Husky Stadium. That game can be seen on Root Sports.

Cd'A plays host to Skyline on Sept. 13.

Tonight's Game

Graham-Kapowsin (Wash.) at Post Falls (0-1): The visitors from Graham, Wash., make their second trip to Post Falls in as many years, as part of a season opener/team building trip. Post Falls won last year's game 27-17.

Friday's Games

Lake City (0-1) at Kennewick (0-0): The good news - Lake City's new spread offense produced 41 points in last week's season opener at Rocky Mountain of Meridian. The bad news - the Timberwolves gave up 63 points.

In last year's game at Lake City, the Timberwolves and Kennewick played to a tie - the first tie in the high school coaching career of Van Troxel, in his 20th season as Lake City coach, and 35th year overall as a high school coach.

Lewiston (0-0) at Lakeland (0-0): Lakeland gave Lewiston a strong game last year in Lewiston before falling 20-7 in the opener. Both teams have new starting quarterbacks this year, with Tyrel Derrick taking over for Lakeland, and Drew Melton at QB for Lewiston - though Melton played quite a bit of QB last year subbing for the injured Cole Zacha.

Timberlake (0-0) vs. Riverside (0-0): Originally scheduled for Chattaroy, Wash., Riverside opted to move this home game to the Kibbie Dome in Moscow as the second game of a doubleheader, with kickoff at 7:30 p.m. Troy and Council are scheduled to play in the first game.

Timberlake won last year's game over Riverside, 45-35 in Spirit Lake.

St. Maries (1-0) at Medical Lake (0-0): St. Maries walloped Kellogg 48-7 in its season opener last week. Last year, Medical Lake triumphed 39-32 at St. Maries.

Kootenai (0-1) at Lakeside (0-0): The game marks the head coaching debut of the Knights' Chris Dohrman, a longtime assistant under Ron Miller. Kootenai opened last week with a 74-40 loss to Wallace.

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Smith, who had an up-and-down preseason, was the team's second-round draft pick out of West Virginia after he was projected by many to be selected early in the opening round.

Despite announcing Smith as the starter for this week, Ryan wouldn't commit to him as the long-term guy under center. It was an approach that was echoed by owner Woody Johnson and general manager John Idzik.

RG3 to slide,

ready to start Monday night

ASHBURN, Va. - Michael Vick says it's taken him 10 years to learn when to slide. Robert Griffin III figures he'll have it down pat just a few days from now.

After eight months of rehab on his reconstructed right knee, it's finally all-systems go for Griffin to play in the prime-time Week 1 opener against Vick and the Philadelphia Eagles. Griffin said there's a chance he could be even more emotional than when he made his NFL debut a year ago. His stated goal: "Play like you were never gone."

Commissioner takes issue with settlement talk

NEW YORK - NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell took issue with the notion that the league's $765 million settlement with former players is a paltry sum compared to the sport's revenues.

"This is a significant amount of money," he said. "The plaintiffs also agreed it was an appropriate amount. The mediator felt it was an appropriate amount."

Goodell made his first public comments since the settlement to the lawsuits was announced last week. More than 4,500 former players, some of them suffering from Alzheimer's disease or depression, accused the NFL of concealing the long-term dangers of concussions and rushing injured players back onto the field.

"We were able to find common ground to be able to get relief to the players and their families now rather than spending years litigating," Goodell said at an event in Manhattan to promote February's New York/New Jersey Super Bowl.

The settlement was announced last Thursday after two months of court-ordered mediation and is subject to approval by a federal judge. It does not include an admission from the NFL that it hid information from players about head injuries.

"We think it's the right thing to move forward and try to do what we can to help our players," Goodell said.

Some former players questioned the size of the settlement, considering it stretches over 20 years and will be divided among thousands of people - and considering the NFL takes in more than $9 billion a year, a figure that will rise when new TV contracts start in 2014.

Goodell noted that those billions are revenues, not profits.