A rainy day at Geer skate park on Feb. 7, 2026 in Salem, Oregon. Photo by Sofie Szigeti. In October, the city of Salem unveiled a brand new skate park in northeast Salem.  The project had been underway since January of the same year, and after a few delays, the park was finally open for business and quickly surged in popularity. In the first few months since its completion, Geer Park has been making waves through the Salem skate community.  Joshua Santos-Díaz (’28) is from Salem and has been around the city to many skate parks. “I know the skate parks around here are not really liked because they are older or not taken care of,” he said. Geer Park, on account of its newness, is nicer than many others around the city. For Santos-Díaz, the new park has sparked increased interest in skating in the Salem community. The increased interest is evident in the variety of ages that show up to skate at the park. Both Santos-Díaz and Jack Godsil (’28) mentioned that younger kids are usually at the park, but there are also plenty of older adults showing off their skills. “I was just out last weekend, and there were a bunch of new and older people from the ’80s generation coming out,” Godsil commented. Godsil was interviewed for the initial article by The Collegian on Geer Park in February of 2025 , and The Collegian followed up with him now that the park has been open for a few months. He explained that the park was a replacement for an old BMX, or bicycle motocross, track, so there are some obstacles that are geared toward bikes rather than Godsil’s chosen skateboard. Godsil explained that these obstacles can be dangerous to skateboarders with “zigs and zags that are hard to navigate,” but, undeterred, he sees it as a fun challenge because “it poses a new way to skate the park.” The difficulties the obstacles present don't take away from the park or steer skaters around Salem away, he said. However, because the park is so new and popular, it can be very crowded. Godsil explained that one of the biggest issues is that the amount of people standing around the obstacles sometimes makes them “unskateable.” New skaters aren’t always aware of the skate park etiquette that keeps things smooth and safe. Expanding on the hazards created by the crowd, Godsil mentioned a recent time he was trying to pull off a trick and there was a group of younger kids standing a little too close to where he would be speeding by.  The crowd is full of people with different skating abilities, and the park does well to accommodate that. There are difficult sections, like the steep walls and old bike tracks, but there are also obstacles that are designed for beginning and intermediate skaters. Godsil emphasized, “It’s a skate park that’s pretty designed for everybody because there are so many different ways to skate it.” Reflecting on how skating has impacted him personally, Santos-Díaz said, “In skating you learn how to fall, pick yourself up, and try again. I think that really shaped a lot of my mentality. As long as you get up, you’ll eventually get it.”

The WITS help desk on Jan. 23, 2026. Photo by Mac Childers. Ahead of the spring semester, the Willamette Integrated Technology Services (WITS) help desk let go of more than half its student workers and cut student hours, leaving some former employees confused. At the end of last semester, the WITS help desk leadership, which provides on-call tech help to the campus community, informed its student workers that their hours would be reduced to 20 hours per week, divided among all student employees.  Student workers were then told that only one and a half student workers out of the five who were active would be retained for regular work with the help desk instead. Jeremy Lovato, the chief information officer for WITS, said the purpose behind this change was to streamline the process of resolving service requests or tickets. “The goal for any IT organization is to have a first point of contact resolution, and that requires your help desk team to deal with highly complex requests and have access to some of our systems that are secure and have access to personal information,” Lovato said. Lovato added that, since they’re trying not to escalate so many tickets up the chain of command, they needed to have more professionally skilled help desk staff. This includes being able to have one student developing deeper relationships with staff, faculty and clients, along with being able to provide the more complex training required to make the help desk more efficient, he said. When asked when the decision to phase out most student help desk workers was made, Lovato said the changes were planned to “go live this calendar year,” and the decision had been made over the course of the fall semester. In a later statement to The Collegian, he spoke further about the intentionality behind the change. “This transition was intentionally planned within WITS as part of aligning staffing with higher expectations for IT service delivery and security, and it was timed at the end of a semester, which is when student employment is typically reassessed,” Lovato said.  Lovato also spoke to the potential for students to be reassigned throughout other IT areas at the university, such as application development and the web development team. When asked to clarify if the students who were working at the help desk had been redistributed to other areas of IT, Lovato restated the staff had been “reduced to one.” Former student workers react Maya Colclazier (’26) and River Hosten (’26) are two such students who were let go from the help desk. Colclazier was an employee at the help desk since August 2022 and was promoted to help desk lead in June before being laid off in December. She felt there was a lack of communication throughout the process. “I think in the time I was working there, it had been kind of all over the place, and then restructuring started when Mr. Lovato came on,” she said. Colclazier witnessed the budget and available work hours, especially for the help desk, get reduced consistently.  “It wasn’t a shock that something like that would happen eventually,” she said. “We just didn’t know when and to what extent it would be.” In line with Lovato’s responses, Colclazier highlighted the importance of consistent service as one of the reasons given for the restructuring, while also discussing concerns with the communication around the situation.  Hosten was a newer hire to the help desk, having been brought on this past July. He noted his surprise at being hired so close to his graduation, and spoke about a seeming lack of effort being put into his training and how he was “mostly trained in things [he] asked to learn about.” Both Hosten and Colclazier spoke about their concerns with the manner of communication used.  “The way that they explained it at the time was very confusing because I think they were trying to make it seem not as bad as it was,” Hosten said. "They originally told us they’d have 20 hours available for student workers a week, but 20 hours split between five student workers is not sustainable to have a living.” Lovato, in a statement responding to concerns brought up by the former student workers, acknowledged the concern students had about the transition. “Anytime roles change, especially in a student employment context, it can be personal, and I take that seriously,” Lovato said. “While the decision itself was made deliberately, I recognize that how change is communicated and experienced matters. That perspective is important to me, and it’s something I carry forward as we continue to lead and improve how we support students through transitions.”

Davis Hester ('27) jumps for rebound against LaVerne on Nov. 7, 2025 in Cone Field House. Having trailed in their home opener by 15 at the half, the team came back to win in overtime. After their semifinal win last night, head coach Mike Lenahan recalled the game as an example of the team's tenacity from the outset of the season. Photo by Jack Godsil. The men’s basketball team triumphed 80-75 over the No. 2 seed Puget Sound Loggers in their first Northwest Conference (NWC) playoff appearance in 11 years last night.  Today, the ’Cats will face the No. 1 seed and NWC tourney hosts, the Whitworth Pirates, whom they’ve lost to twice in the season so far. The game will be streamed from Spokane, Washington on FloSports at 5 p.m. Following a disappointing 2025 season in which they placed dead last in conference, the Bearcats defied the odds to clinch the finals with a No. 3 NWC finish in the regular season.  In the semifinal matchup against Puget Sound, the Bearcats saw solid performances from veterans and rookies alike, with Tanner Overby (ʼ28) logging four steals and 20 points, Davis Hester (ʼ27) stepping up to drop 14 points and two steals, including a crucial one late game to seal the game, and Kellen Sande (ʼ27), who had been a solid but relatively quiet presence for the ’Cats in the regular season, leading all scorers with 26 points and blowing his season points-per-game (PPG) average of eight out of the water. After the game, Sande, who won a high school state championship with Cascade High School, said he thrives on a playoff atmosphere. “It’s easy to get up for,” he said, “to trust the work you’ve put in and go in confident.” He gave all “glory and praise to Jesus Christ” and asked that Willamette community members tune into the game tonight. Willamette was able to overwhelm Puget Sound with their signature lightning-fast play, earning 18 fast break points and 19 points earned off turnovers. The ’Cats were outmatched by the Loggers in offensive rebounds, nabbing just five to the Loggers’ 13, but they were able to bring the Loggers’ tally down from 23 in their last meeting. Still, defensive rebounding will be a main focus tonight in the finals against a big, physical Whitworth side. Head coach Mike Lenahan said that the Bearcats were able to win by playing with joy and allowing the close game to ebb and flow while remaining confident. “Over the course of the game there are about 160 possessions,” he said. “Every one matters, but none of them matter too much.” An unlikely rise The ʼCats season has thus far been marked by the spectacular rise of Tanner Overby. In the 2024-25 season, the rookie Overby scored 61 points. Heading into the conference final, he has scored 516 points, he holds the school PPG record, which was last set in 1991, and he is the NWC player of the year. He is the first Willamette men’s basketball player to earn player of the year since Mike Ward (ʼ93) did it in 1993, according to the NWC archives . Like Overby, the squad was nearly all brand-new to the limelight this season. Lenahan wrote to The Collegian that of the 10 players who saw the court the most this year, only one had averaged double-digit minutes last year. Lenahan himself is new to the program in his third year as head coach. In his own rookie season, he was able to take the squad, which had won only one conference game the season prior, to within a hair’s width of tournament play at No. 5 in the conference, tied for No. 3. Despite the promising rookie season, last season the team floundered, winning just three conference games. Now, Lenahan’s troops have gone from stat-sheet oversights to championship contenders seemingly in a matter of months. The Buccs are balling The Bearcats will take on the Pirates in the conference final today, who bested No. 4 ranked Lewis & Clark last night 76-60. The Pirates have been utterly dominant in the regular season, only losing two games in conference play and going 20-5 overall.  The last time the ’Cats made it to the NWC finals in 2003, they fell to Whitworth. Since 1994, the Pirates have won 17 championships and appeared in 22 finals, making them the winningest team in NWC men’s hoops by a wide margin in the 21st century.  The ’Cats will need to mitigate opposing offensive rebounds and maintain their good defensive form to beat the brutally efficient Pirates. The Buccs specialize in high shot efficiency and lockdown defense, leading the NWC with an opponent field goal percentage of just 38% and a scoring margin of 12.3.  In layman’s terms, Whitworth averages 12 more points per game than any opponent they face, with Willamette being the next best team in the NWC with 3.7. The Pirates are led in almost every statistical category by senior Stephen Behil, including points, minutes and defensive rebounds. If the Bearcats pull off the win, it will be the second year in a row that a team that finished last in NWC men’s basketball standings the prior season came back the next year to win the championship after the River Otters achieved the feat in 2025. As for the team’s approach tonight, Lenahan said they’re playing to “get to spend another week together.” Referring to the Bearcats’ two regular season losses to the Buccs, Sande seemed entirely unfazed when speaking over the phone shortly after the team’s semifinal win.  “They’re going to have to beat us three times,” he said. “It’s tough to beat a good team twice, let alone three times.”

Cathy and Heathcliff read the book. Art by Basil Allen. As of 2024, 54% of U.S. adults  have a literacy rate below the sixth-grade level, and film director Emerald Fennell has demonstrated the scope of the issue with her recent adaptation of “Wuthering Heights” based on the 1847 novel by Emily Brontë.  Considered one of the most controversial novels of its time for its intense depictions of violence, generational trauma and its perspective on racism, it is only fitting that the recent film adaptation has also received immense controversy. But that’s where the similarities end. Suffice to say, it’s devastating to learn that Fennell has an English degree from the University of Oxford.  Since the film takes almost nothing from the novel except for the general location and part of the cast, it leads one to wonder why not create an original film entirely? The novel touches on the issue of racism through the character Heathcliff, a man of color who becomes violent because of the abuse he suffers at the hands of others through structural racism.  He is constantly othered by his adopted family and is horrifically abused, making him an abusive person in turn. Fennell's choice of Jacob Elordi, a white man, to play Heathcliff is the first sign of the film’s total ignorance of the source material.  By erasing Heathcliff’s racial struggle, a key part of understanding the story is lost. Yes, the novel is about class struggle, but it is equally about racial struggle. In the novel, Heathcliff is described frequently as “dark-skinned” or a “lascar” and is also subjected to a slew of racial slurs directed towards people with darker skin.  Fennell has defended her choices , saying that they were “wish fulfillment” and that she wanted to make something that was her “response and interpretation to that book and the feeling of it,” not a faithful adaptation.  However, if her casting choices show the wish fulfillment she sought, then that says something much deeper about her. She cannot see a main character in the story as non-white but can make originally white, lesser characters people of color. The most glaring examples of this include casting Nelly, Catherine’s maid, as a Southeast Asian woman and Edgar, Catherine’s unjust husband, as a Pakistani man. If this is Fennell’s interpretation of “Wuthering Heights,” then perhaps she ought to have her literature degree exchanged for a certificate in Aryan BDSM videography. Other problems with Fennell’s adaptation include the erasure of Hindley, Catherine’s brother, and the last half of the novel failing to exist. Hindley, as a character, is meant to be someone the reader can compare Heathcliff to and abuses both Heathcliff and Catherine after their father dies.  Hindley’s son, Hareton, is saved by Heathcliff from sudden death, giving him a reconciliation within the story. Without Hindley and Hareton, Heathcliff is entirely the same throughout the film and exists as a one-dimensional character. Due to this, there is no resolution to the story; Hareton and young Catherine do not exist to end the generational trauma suffered by the family, since Catherine miscarries at the end of the film. Without a resolution, the characters fall flat, and many of the central themes that made the original story a literary classic fall short of their true potential. One of my final annoyances with this adaptation was the choice of turning Isabella, canonically a victim of domestic violence at the hand of Heathcliff, into a sex freak and making Catherine vanilla in comparison.  At the beginning of the film, Catherine is introduced as a child who maniacally cackles at the sight of a hanging. However, when Catherine sees two of her servants having sex with whips and a horse bridle, she is aghast. At this point, it seems Fennell forgot that Catherine’s ideal gift as a child in the novel is, in fact, a whip. In contrast, Isabella is presented in the film as a bookish girl who still plays with dolls. At the same time, she demonstrates a liking for roleplay as a dog for Heathcliff, which would have been impactful if her dog were slaughtered by Heathcliff, like in the novel. But the film refuses to expand upon the symbolism from the novel and uses sexual desires as a shock factor. Now, if Fennell had chosen to create an original film inspired by “Wuthering Heights,” à la “50 Shades of Grey” to “Twilight,” there wouldn’t have been so much to complain about. “Wuthering Heights” is, understandably, one of the hardest novels to adapt to film. All adaptations so far have lacked at least some important aspects of the novel because there is so much content and symbolism to sift through that it’s hard to pin down what is most important to focus on.  But choosing a story known for its criticism of institutionalized classism and racism and turning it into a horny romantic drama will never be appealing.  If media literacy is dead and buried, Emerald Fennell is among those holding a shovel.

ODP, WEB and Lū‘au among student groups with lowered spring budgets ASWU Treasurer Mitch Septoff ('26) presents at the ASWU senate meeting on Jan. 29, 2026. Photo by Lucy Devlaeminck. Disclaimer: As a student organization, The Collegian was also impacted by funding changes. Advocacy efforts remain separate from news coverage. Willamette’s student organizations are facing significant funding cuts. In December , the Associated Students of Willamette University (ASWU) senate voted to give the university’s student organizations — the Willamette Events Board (WEB), Outdoor Program (ODP) and The Collegian — $20,000 each as a “tide over” until a consensus could be reached on how best to manage ASWU’s funds moving forward.  “We just don’t have as much money as we used to,” said ASWU Senator and finance board member Peyton Edmunds (’29). According to ASWU Treasurer Mitch Septoff (’26), one of the reasons for this lack of funding is that post-COVID, there are simply more clubs and organizations making requests during funding rounds, meaning that ASWU does not have the money to grant them all.  Clubs tend to make requests in all three funding rounds for a semester, while organizations typically only request funding in the pre-fall and pre-spring funding rounds.  In the 2026 pre-spring round, ASWU had a budget of $150,000 set aside for organizations, plus an additional $30,000 left from the fall semester that was not put back into the Reserve to help cover this semester’s gap.  However, organizations requested over $220,000.  When it was time for ASWU to vote on pre-spring funding, Septoff said, “The recommendation that the finance board came up with was not well-informed enough for my liking or the liking of other people in the organizations.” This led Septoff to recommend that the ASWU senate give organizations $20,000. That way, “organizations who needed to make payments and disbursements over winter break would have the ability to do so, without [the senate] making a final decision on funding.”  This decision was also in part, he said, because “all the organizations requested [a minimum of] $30,000, and we know we probably weren’t going to cut below $20,000.” Complicating matters further, Septoff said, there is no organizational funding precedent for student orgs the way there is for clubs. Organizations are generally larger than clubs, and certain things, like Leadership Awards, can not be cut between fall and spring semesters.  “The organizational precedents, if they ever existed, fell out of use so thoroughly that we actually don't have record of them today,” Septoff said. He added that while the finance board is working to draft a new precedent, without it, the ASWU senate and finance board are left to make “best judgment decisions.”  Septoff said that when making cuts, one of the things that the finance board considers is “discretionary versus mandatory spending,” essentially looking for what can be cut without impacting the quality of the organization. On Jan. 29 , after some deliberation, the ASWU senate voted to confirm the budgets for organizations this spring.  Organizations, clubs respond  ODP provided two possible budgets to ASWU, one was their original ask for $60,000, as well as a reduced ask of $41,000. ASWU voted to fund the reduced budget, meaning that ODP is facing the largest cuts of any of the student organizations this round.  According to Outdoor Program Coordinator Kira Grimes (’26), these cuts “pretty drastically impacted the number of trips and the types of trips that we could run.” Grimes said that ODP is working to “maximize our outdoor programming with the reduced funding that we would be getting in this semester.”  WEB had initially requested around $35,000. In the end, ASWU allocated $30,000 to WEB instead — a roughly 15% cut from their ask.  That total allocation was still thousands over ASWU’s target budget. The ASWU senate voted to pass this allotment with the agreement that WEB will cut another $8,500  in the fall.  “If we had accepted the amount that was originally proposed to us…,” said WEB President Zia Brandstetter (’26), “it would have devastated us as an organization.”  Even then, the budget that was approved this January “cut a lot of stuff,” she said. While WEB does keep the profits from Black Tie in a non-ASWU-affiliated account, Brandstetter shared that the account is “not huge, but it’s sort of supplemental.” Brandstetter said these budget conversations are never trivial. “Midnight Breakfast can't go away. Black Tie can’t go away again.” She added, “It is a difficult decision for everyone involved, and I do not envy the finance board, or the ASWU treasurer’s position, or ASWU exec at all.”  The Collegian, which also has its own ad revenue, had the lowest reduction out of any student organization — down 5% from its original ask — with expectations to reduce spending further in the fall. Lū‘au, though it is not technically an organization, is also facing funding cuts, explained President of Hawai‘i Club and co-coordinator of Lū‘au Payton Kawahara (’27). While Hawai‘i Club is funded separately, the Lū‘au funding request was made during the same pre-spring funding round. As of Feb. 19, Kawahara said they are still not funded. Kawahara said the Lū‘au planning committee originally requested $35,000, which was less than the previous year. However, their requested budget has since been cut down to $21,000, but “it is still not entirely approved.” On Feb. 12 , the ASWU senate voted to partially fund Lū‘au to the amount of $5,800. Kawahara noted that Lū‘au is “cutting a lot of things we normally wouldn’t have thought to cut in the past,” including things like the T-shirts for the dancers and volunteers. Kawahara added that to compensate for the potential funding cuts, they will be holding fundraisers at Panda Express on Feb. 27 and April 3.  “We care about things a lot,” ASWU Senator Edmunds said. “And a lot of the cuts we make, we don’t want to make.”

Bearcats enjoy the 2023 edition of the Black Tie Affair. Photo by Anushka Srivastav. One year after its cancellation due to problems with event logistics and a resulting lack of ticket sales  following the event’s move to PNCA , the Willamette Events Board’s (WEB) historically popular Black Tie Affair is set for March 7 from 8-11:30 p.m. at the Salem Convention Center downtown. The theme for this year's event is "Royal Ball." Jodi Santillie, assistant director for Student Engagement and Leadership and advisor to WEB, said that the cancellation of the decades-old annual dance last year was not due to a lack of student interest, but rather a conflict with booking the Convention Center.  Without their normal venue, WEB tried to see if the PNCA campus would be a better fit for the event. However, there were logistical issues with the location, and the individual ticket price for the event significantly increased, making it no longer reasonable to host the event, Santillie said.  The theme of the Black Tie Affair is different every year. Santillie explained that there is an extensive process that goes into the decision.  “[WEB goes] through a process where we do a huge brainstorming session to choose a theme,” Santillie said. “The Royal Ball theme kind of stemmed from a twofold thing where we knew we had a lot of things in our storage that would fit the theme, and also the team enjoys things like Bridgerton.” WEB will also provide appetizers and desserts for attendees. Additionally, there will be a 21+ lounge for attendees of age to enjoy drinks at an appropriate pace, Santillie said. For first-time attendees, Santillie recommended that students dress to the theme, wear comfortable shoes and bring what they can carry.  “The Convention Center is very particular about [certain] things. You need to check in coats and purses,” she said. “The least amount [of items] that you can bring with you, the better just because the coat check gets a little hectic.” The last time Black Tie Affair was hosted, in the spring semester of 2024, WEB estimated that there were over 680 people in attendance.   “[The Black Tie Affair] is [WEB’s] largest event outside of Midnight Breakfast,” Santillie said.    Students can buy tickets online for $17 up until Feb. 28 or pay $20 on the day of the event. The Salem Convention Center will allow no entry into the event after 10 p.m. Any accommodation requests should be directed to the Willamette Events Board.

The Constitutional Heritage Club tables in Jackson Plaza on Jan. 13, 2026. Photo by Lucy Devaleminck. Last semester, senior Lexi Thorsett (’26) filed with ASWU to affiliate a Willamette University chapter of the national organization Turning Point USA (TPUSA). Such affiliation would allow them to reserve spaces on campus and potentially gain access to ASWU funding. In November, ASWU senators voted unanimously to refuse affiliation  to the group. This spring, Thorsett applied for ASWU affiliation for a group called “Constitutional Heritage Club” (CHC). The senate is voting on the club’s affiliation at Thursday’s meeting after a brief deliberation during last week’s meeting and an original recommendation from the Club Approval Committee to affiliate the new club.  Despite the new name, the CHC seems to carry over some of the plans and relationships from the original push for a TPUSA chapter. Changing tactics When ASWU unanimously refused to affiliate Thorsett’s TPUSA chapter last semester based on concern for student safety and comfort on campus, Thorsett said, “It was like I hit a wall I couldn’t get through.” Recognizing ASWU’s refusal as relating directly to her club’s identity as a TPUSA-named and affiliated group, Thorsett returned to the drawing board with the other executive members of the proposed club, its advisor, Willamette’s Director of Residence Life and Housing, Aaron Hukari, and its Turning Point Cascades representative, Sawyer Stone. Since some senators stated they would accept a general politically conservative club, Thorsett said she renamed the group to limit reasons for another refusal. Following the ASWU affiliation vote in November, TPUSA representatives also discussed TPUSA’s previous legal actions at other universities that similarly denied TPUSA chapters . Thorsett said she doesn’t want to pursue that avenue. “I don't want a legal battle at all,” she said. “I've done legal stuff for, like, a car wreck, and it was a nightmare. So, I was like, ‘Please, let's not go that route.’” In terms of legal support, however, she made it clear that the option still exists, saying, “I don’t want to threaten legal action at all, but it is on the table because it has happened before at other schools. Affiliate us; if we break any of ASWU's rules, if we break any of our constitutional rules, disband us. They have every right to do so if we become problematic.” Lisa Holliday, associate dean of students and director of Student Engagement and Leadership (SEAL), couldn’t recall a time in the past 20 or so years when a club was rejected by ASWU. “If everything’s taken care of in the packet, and we’ve checked all the boxes, historically, they have approved these organizations,” she said. Peyton Edmunds (’29), an ASWU senator and member of the finance board — which is also the club approval committee — had, along with the rest of ASWU, been against affiliation of the TPUSA club in its original state. However, she expressed that as long as the group wouldn’t make students feel unsafe and remained separate from the national organization, she would vote to affiliate them. “I think I’ve made that clear … that if they want a Young Republicans on campus, I’ll support it,” she said. When Thorsett’s club filed affiliation paperwork for the Constitutional Heritage Club, no national affiliation was listed. Edmunds and the rest of the committee recommended the senate to approve the club’s affiliation at the Feb. 16 finance board meeting. However, it seems CHC still has connections to TPUSA.  According to both the TPUSA Cascades and CHC Instagram pages, Willamette University is listed as affiliated with Turning Point. On Wednesday, Feb. 18, the CHC’s Instagram page included “TPUSA affiliated” in its bio. By that Friday, amid discussions between The Collegian, ASWU senators and members of the club, it instead read: “Powered by TPUSA.” “I literally need the affiliation just to reserve a space,” Thorsett said of ASWU’s approval. “I’m not asking for money. … We still have ties to TPUSA, because they are going to support us financially if we need any money for anything.” When The Collegian asked Edmunds on Feb. 19 about this apparent connection and how it may impact Edmunds’ decision to recommend affiliation, she stated, “If that is true — and I am going to attempt to figure that out from the source — my conviction is going to be what it originally was. I am against the affiliation [of TPUSA] itself, as that’s what generally makes people feel unsafe on campus.” The Club Approval Committee unanimously recommended approving Constitutional Heritage Club’s affiliation during the finance board meeting on Feb. 16. However, during the broader ASWU meeting three days later, senators moved to table the vote regarding whether or not to affiliate the club until the Feb. 26 meeting.  The affiliation question ASWU requires disclosure of affiliations with national organizations within its club application paperwork , also asking for disclosure on where prospective clubs will receive funding from other than ASWU.  Within that, however, SEAL and ASWU don’t have a set definition of what constitutes being “affiliated” with a national organization. Holliday noted, “I think the whole thing is going to be looked at as we establish a new norm going forward.”  Aaron Hukari was selected as the prospective club’s advisor amid its startup effort last term and said he welcomes the chance to work more closely with students. He added that part of a university's responsibility is to prepare students to find new ways of thinking.  “ An engaged political discussion from many different viewpoints also provides opportunities to develop our own political sensibilities and evolve our perspectives,” Hukari said. “Only providing resources or access to one part of the political spectrum hinders this perspective sharing, conversation, and evolution.” Edmunds confirmed that no national affiliation was listed on the CHC’s application, and that there was no mention of where they would be receiving funding from outside ASWU. “We left the affiliation part off our application,” Thorsett said. “I was advised to not add it for the time being, from my club advisor.” Hukari told The Collegian they have not received requested guidance or clarity from ASWU on any specific requirements, criteria or factors for what constitutes a formal, external affiliation, or how to provide more information on how these organizations are separate. “ Having clear definitions and guidelines would prevent the nebulous conversation occurring now about what is and is not an external affiliation and whether or not that should impact ASWU-affiliation,” he said. Hukari stated that while he had met the Turning Point representative when CHC tabled an event in late January, he didn’t have any connection with the TPUSA organization.  “As far as I know, there is no official connection between the two,” he said. “There is certainly the partnership they have in terms of they are conservative students on campus who were interested at some point in affiliating with them.” Until things “calm down,” as Thorsett put it, she and other leaders are keeping Turning Point updated on their club status and said they are still being considered official by the organization as a result. But they’re doing more of what Willamette’s governing student body wants them to do — like change their name.  “They think just the name [Turning Point] brings violence and a lack of safety for the school,” Thorsett said of ASWU. “Okay, let me change the name then.  “I’m trying to minimize the reasons why they would deny us.” ASWU’s next meeting is Feb. 26 at 7 p.m. in Montag Den.

Tanner Overby ('28) goes up for a basket against Puget Sound on Jan. 10, 2026 in Cone Field House. Photo courtesy of the Willamette Athletics Department. The 2025-26 season has been nothing short of historic for Willamette men’s basketball. The team’s regular season record finished at 15-10, their best since at least the 2006-07 season. Last week, they secured a place in the conference tournament for the first time since 2015. They finished the regular season at No. 3 in the conference, up from dead last at the end of the 2024-25 contest. They will play the Puget Sound Loggers at 5:30 p.m. on Friday in Spokane. The ’Cats this year owe a large part of their success to Tanner Overby (’28), who is averaging 24.8 points per game (PPG) and shooting over 53% from the field. He is currently on track to break the Willamette single-season PPG record, which hasn’t been broken since the 1990-91 season. He leads the Northwest Conference (NWC) in PPG by a wide margin, with No. 2 Anthony Hrobka of Pacific averaging 20.7 PPG. Overby’s rise in the stat sheet has been meteoric. Last season, he saw the court 21 times but scored only 61 points. In the 20 games of the 2025-26 season so far, he has 496 points. “Of our 10 players averaging double digit minutes this year only one averaged double digit minutes last year,” head coach Mike Lenahan wrote in an email to The Collegian.“We came into the season picked last in the conference and I think that was due to having so many student-athletes in new roles, but we knew we had a talented group and knew the identity we wanted to create of relentless pace, competitiveness and togetherness,” he wrote. The fast-paced Willamette leads the conference in PPG with an average of 82.6, but they also give up the third-most points per game, a statistic which they’ll need to clean up as they head into the tournament to face the most offensively efficient teams in the NWC.  Men’s basketball faces the No. 2 Loggers in the conference semifinals on Friday, Feb. 27. The ’Cats split their regular season series with the Loggers, losing their first meeting 63-93 on Jan. 10 and winning the second 88-78 on Feb. 6.  The difference maker in both games was shot efficiency: in the first matchup, the Loggers absolutely dominated the Bearcats in shot percentage, going 56.4% from the floor and 50% exactly from three. The ’Cats, on the other hand, shot 25.8% from the floor and 12.5% from three, making just three of 24 attempts.  These stats were flipped in the second game between the two, in which the Bearcats made 54.9% of field goals attempted and a whopping 57.1% of threes attempted to the Loggers’ 41.8% and 38.5%, respectively.  “The team has totally bought in and just tried to get a little better at our identity each day, and when you combine that with the love they have for each other and how hard they play for each other we've been able to improve a lot over the course of the season,” Lenahan wrote. The Bearcats have been in excellent form in recent weeks, having lost just one of their last five games, and in those five games they’ve averaged a 45.92% shot percentage, around 2% better than their season average. If the ’Cats can maintain their good form and shot selection, they’ll be able to cruise past the Loggers for a chance to win the NWC tourney for the first time since 2000. In the other semifinal, hosts No. 1 Whitworth will take on the defending champions No. 4 Lewis & Clark. Last year, the River Otters shocked the Buccs to win in an identical semifinal matchup, having finished in last place the season prior. The Student Athlete Advisory Committee will send the team off to Spokane at around 9 a.m. this morning. The game will be broadcast through FloSports, which can be accessed through the Willamette Athletics site . “ The most exciting thing about making the playoffs … is we get to make another week of memories together with this group,” Lenahan wrote.

A duck in a Willamette jersey about to score a goal on the soccer field while the crowd cheers behind them. Art by Wes Mowry-Silverman. Welcome back, Bearcat Fan! I am in another week of fast break-writing hell, because dear God we have so many sports competing. On the bright side, we found lots of success this last full weekend of February. Let’s get the news over with! Men’s basketball capped off their regular season by splitting the weekend series 1-1, trouncing the Linfield Wildcats 83-69 on Friday and falling to the River Otters 83-92 in Portland on Saturday. Our ’Cats head off this weekend to Spokane for the NWC Tournament, their first appearance in the contest in 11 years.  Women’s basketball  also finished up their regular season by splitting the weekend, barely losing to the Wildcats 55-58 on senior night but beating Lewis & Clark in Portland 86-67. In the latter, senior Kaitlin Imai  (’26) capped off her career by dropping 26 points on the River Otters and shooting over 56% from the field. Congrats to our Bearcats on a great season! Baseball faced the Milwaukee School of Engineering (MSOE) in a doubleheader on Saturday, losing the first game 8-10 and rallying back to win the second 14-10. The Basecats were meant to face the Lutes on Sunday, but the game was cancelled outright due to rain. Shocking. Softball  also split their Saturday doubleheader (I’m sensing a theme here) against Warner Pacific, losing the first 10-14 and winning the second 11-8.  Men’s tennis lost both outings over the weekend, falling to the George Fox Bruins 2-5 on Saturday and the River Otters 1-6 on Sunday. That said, this year has been a significant improvement for the Bearcats, as men’s tennis the year prior did not win a single point in team scoring against any conference opponent. The same cannot be said for this year, as the ’Cats have seen success particularly in their doubles matchups. Women’s tennis also lost their outings over the weekend, going 1-6 against the Bruins and 1-6 versus the River Otters. In the former match, track defector Katrina Briggs (’26) secured the single point for the ’Cats by brutally defeating the Bruins’ No. 6 singles player, not permitting her opponent a single game and winning both sets 6-0.  Women’s track concluded their short indoor season, with Whitley Stepp  (’26) placing No. 2 at the second George Fox Indoor Meet by clearing 1.65 meters. In the wider world of sport: Team USA destroyed the Canadians in their own sport, with both the men’s and women’s teams securing gold in hockey over the weekend. This marks the first time in 40 years that the Americans have won gold in men’s hockey. USA! USA! The U.S. also dominated in figure skating, largely thanks to Alysa Liu’s gold medal in women’s singles and gold in the team event … whatever that is.  In the coming weeks:   Men’s basketball  will face the No. 2 Puget Sound Loggers in Spokane on Friday for the conference semifinals, surely to an inevitable victory. Softball heads south to the Lone Star State to face Southwestern in a doubleheader on Friday and then against East Texas Baptist on Saturday, staying in the state for a long weekend of competition. Baseball heads to Forest Grove to face Pacific on Saturday, and then plays the Boxers at home on Sunday. Track and field  heads south to Roseburg to face Umpqua Community College in a meet that doesn’t count for national rankings, and tennis faces Puget Sound in Tacoma on Saturday. … I think that’s everything. Yay Bearcats!

Women watch the "Heated Rivalry" romance unfold. Art by Basil Allen. Over the past few months, “Heated Rivalry” fever has swept the nation. The HBO show focuses on the sexual, and later romantic, relationship between two professional hockey players, Ilya Rosanov and Shane Hollander. Unfortunately for everyone, the real heated rivalry was not playing out on the ice, it was happening online.  This conversation was inevitable, considering the show centered sex, queerness and worst of all, queer sex. This backlash only compounded when the show’s creator, Jacob Tierney , revealed that the show’s primary audience was women. While many found the show’s female fan base to be leering and fetishistic (and admittedly, some fans were), this reaction neglected to recognize the complex reasons many women feel so drawn to queer male stories. Not only did the show provide many people a safe space to indulge in their desire, it proved that queer, complicated and graphic stories deserve a place onscreen.  I thought I’d be able to avoid this discourse, considering the show didn’t pique my interest. I don’t know about hockey. I don’t care about hockey. To me, a Stanley Cup is just a water bottle for TJ Maxx moms, so I didn’t think “Heated Rivalry” would have any place in my life. However, after a lot of encouragement from my friends, I acquiesced and ended up in my best friend’s basement, watching soft-core gay porn with a group of five other women.  Initially, I disliked the show. I found the show’s near constant use of time jumps in the first few episodes to be disconcerting, the dialogue to be poorly written, and the characters to be stiff and unlikable. I felt alienated, realizing that others liked the characters because of just how stiff they were. And yet, over the course of the series, I changed my mind completely. I grew to love Ilya’s confidence, even his downright rudeness, especially when paired with the measured but undeniably awkward Shane. I found their banter, corny as it was, heartwarming. Despite myself, I was a fan.  My experience — watching the show with a group of women — is not unique. Women are no strangers to the male/male romance space. Some of the first fanfiction , which imagined a relationship between Captain Kirk and Spock from Star Trek, was written and distributed by female fans. And for as long as women have been fantasizing about gay male relationships, they’ve been critiqued for it.  Many members of the queer community feel it is fetishistic , analogous to the popularity of lesbian porn with straight male viewers. By placing a marginalized community at the center of a sexual fantasy, it serves to further dehumanize and other them. When the content is written by people outside of the community, it can flatten the nuances of queer relationships, reducing one man purely to the feminine role and one to the masculine role in order to recreate a patriarchal, straight dynamic.  While these criticisms are reasonable, this discourse often overlooks the many queer women who enjoy gay male romance. It disregards that the power differential between women and queer men is very different than that of straight men and queer women. Even romance content catered towards women often features their violence and objectification, so it can be refreshing to consume content that avoids these issues entirely .  As Lucy Neville, author  of a book about women’s relationship with gay male erotica , says, “Erotic stories that focus exclusively on men sidestep the kind of gendered power imbalances that structure intimacy between men and women, both in fiction and in real life.” Many women have stated that they appreciate seeing masculinity without the toxicity, content that shows intensity need not come at the expense of consent , and most simply, when you’re attracted to men, two times the men means two times the potential for attraction. Admittedly, even this defense can detract from the challenges of the gay male dating scene, but it makes clear that the desires and intentions of these women are not as sinister as many believe.  In an ideal world, women would not have to forsake heterosexuality to envision romance where their desire is not contextualized by the confines of patriarchy. Yet, even in this world, many women may still gravitate towards media that centers queer men. An attempt to avoid misogyny doesn't have to be the only explanation for their preference. Yearning is often separate from identity. People’s fantasies will always diverge from their reality, and that is not inherently fetishistic. People deserve a space to explore their sexuality without the constant confines of labels and to explore their desires for masculinity and femininity, both in their partners and in themselves. To advocate for a world where exploration is limited by labels and binaires is a very reductive way to conceptualize sexuality.  “Heated Rivalry,” in its most essential distillation, is a rejection of these antiquated conceptions of sexuality. The show, from the very beginning, places sex at the center of its romance. Sex is often seen as the culmination of a slow burn, a reward for being chaste and well-behaved. Stories start with emotional closeness, and sex follows. In “Heated Rivalry,” the relationship starts with sex; it is the emotional closeness that follows. Not only does this rebuff traditional norms around relationships, it’s unique in the current media landscape. According to a 2024 analysis conducted by The Ringer , sex is becoming less common on screen.  Many attribute this phenomenon to the “ puriteens ,” a supposed cadre of sexually conservative young people, who oppose everything from casual sex to kink at pride to sex on screen. While the impact of this group is vastly overstated online, it’s true that many young people said that sex is unnecessary in most shows and movies, at least according to a UCLA poll . Talker Research  also reported that 43% percent of Gen Z participants said they turn a movie off once they hit a sex scene.  This is reasonable to a certain extent, as many members of Gen Z are still in their relatively early teens, and as such, may feel uncomfortable with depictions of sex. However, it appears that even people outside of that age range increasingly believe that sex is a distraction from plot.  “Heated Rivalry” turns this notion on its head, proving over and over just how important sex can be as a component of a larger narrative . Sex is a part of romance; it’s a part of how many people connect and communicate. It’s a part of life, so of course it deserves to be a part of stories. Especially for something as taboo as queer sex, it’s groundbreaking that the show has received such mainstream acclaim and popularity. It undermines the claim that queer stories have to be squeaky clean and wholesome to be accepted.  Both the relationship and the sex depicted in “Heated Rivalry” are complicated and messy, but the show doesn’t have to hide that fact to be heartwarming and widely beloved. The show isn’t wildly subversive — it still features two conventionally masculine and attractive men who appear to end up in a monogamous relationship — but it provides a glimpse of a sexier, more playful future, one where everyone is a little more free to puck around and find out.