Slant

Oregon Women’s Basketball is off to Tampa, Florida, to compete in the Final Four, the first time in program history after beating Mississippi State 88-84 on Sunday, March 31. The women have gotten close in previous years, but 2019 is their year. Much of this is thanks to Sabrina Ionescu, who raked in 31 points, eight assists, seven rebounds and a steal in that March 31 game. If Ariana Grande is right about God being a woman, we’re certain it’s Ionescu.

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The lady ducks celebrate after their victory against Mississippi state

Photo courtesy Eric Evans/GoDucks.com

• Gov. Kate Brown named 83-year-old Republican Bev Clarno of Redmond to fill the vacancy in the office of the Secretary of State left by the death of Dennis Richardson. While there’s State Treasurer Tobias Read, Oregon is mostly governed by women. However, in Congress both of our senators and all but one member of the House are men. A woman gave Rep. Greg Walden a real race in 2018, and that could happen again in 2020.

• An environmental lawyer who came to Eugene in the spring of 2017 for the Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide Fellows Program has been elected president of Slovakia in a stunning upset. You may remember Zuzana Caputova speaking in May 2017 at an ELAW Global Community Conversation at Sam Bond’s in Eugene. She won the important Goldman Environmental Prize in 2016. New York Times reporter Marc Santora writes: “Beyond Slovakia, Ms. Caputova’s unlikely rise and broad support in this deeply conservative country has given hope to opposition leaders in other countries, who sense that a backlash against populists may be brewing.” A global environmental law network, ELAW is headquartered in Eugene.

Speaking of April Fools, EW’s annual satire issue took some readers by surprise. The goal of satire is to hold up our follies, laugh at them and call attention to them to fix them. Sometimes that hurts a little, but it’s in good fun and out of the belief we as a newspaper and as a metro area can improve. So no, Phil Knight did not buy EW, Fyre 2.0 is not coming to Eugene, as far as we know the University of Oregon is not building over the Pioneer Cemetery and, finally, Mayor Lucy Vinis is not secretly Kitty Piercy, though we appreciate both their hard work on homeless issues and the environment.