Lawrence Today, Fall 2003
Track and field
Kolade Agbaje-Williams, ’06, made Lawrence University
history during the outdoor season, becoming the first track athlete from the
school to be an All-American indoors and outdoors during the same year. He accomplished
the feat by taking eighth in the long jump with
a leap of 22 feet, 9 inches, at the NCAA Division III Outdoor Championships
in May and taking sixth in the long jump at the indoor meet last March.
Agbaje-Williams, who hails from Evergreen Park, Ill., also won the long jump and triple jump at the Midwest Conference (MWC) Championships and was named the meet’s Outstanding Male Field Performer. Janesville’s Shelley Ebert, ’03, won the 800 and 1,500 meters and was named the Outstanding Female Track Performer.
Ebert qualified for the NCAA Championships in the 800 but failed to reach the finals. Sarah Slivinski, ’03, of Eagle River, qualified in the heptathlon and took tenth place with a school-record total of 4,345 points.
Golf
The golf team turned back the clock this spring,
when they placed second in the MWC Championships, their highest finish since
1954, with a 36-hole
total score of 616. Knox College won the title with a score of 609.
While it has been 49 years since Lawrence finished as high as second at the conference meet, it has been even longer since the Vikings won back-to-back individual titles. When Joe Loehnis, ’06, captured the individual crown by carding birdies on the first two playoff holes, he became the second consecutive Lawrence golfer to win the title. Jeff Henderson, ’05, won it in 2002. This is the first time Lawrence golfers have won it for two years running since Carl Laumann, ’50, and Don Strutz, ’49, in 1948 and ’49.
Andy Link, ’06, joined Loehnis as an all-conference performer after he finished tenth at the conference meet. Lawrence won the Ripon College Invitational and took the team titles at the Beloit College and Carroll College tournaments.
Softball
Jenny Burris, ’04, continued to pile up individual honors, as
Lawrence won another North Division championship.
The Vikings put together
a record of 15-11-1 (8-5 in the conference) to win their second
consecutive North Division title and fifth crown in seven years. Lawrence
hosted the MWC
Tournament, but the Vikings lost their first two games and were eliminated.
Burris, a shortstop from Gurnee, Ill., was chosen as the North Division Player of the Year for the second straight season. Second base Shannon Arendt, ’04, and centerfielder Becca Reason, ’06, were also named to the team. Burris hit a blistering .494 on the season with nine doubles, three homers, 26 runs batted in (RBIs), and 19 stolen bases. Arendt, a Hortonville native, hit .419 in the conference with six doubles and six RBIs. Reason, who hails from Minnetonka, Minn., batted .393 with a double, eight RBIs, and 17 stolen bases.
For the second consecutive season, Burris was a first-team All-Great Lakes Region selection, and Reason was named to the second team.
Men’s
tennis
The men’s tennis team fell short of its goal of winning
the MWC championship, but the Vikings’ second-place finish was their
best since 1989.
Lawrence qualified for the four-team tournament to determine the conference champion and defeated Grinnell College in the semifinals before falling to Ripon College in the title match.
Madison’s Nick Beyler, ’05, won the No. 4 singles title for the second consecutive season, beating Steve Bachta of Knox College 6-2, 6-4, in the championship match.
At No. 1 singles, Jai Arora, ’04, of Mumbai, India, rolled to the finals, but Jared Goerlitz of Ripon defeated Arora 5-7, 6-4, 6-3, to win the title. Fabrice Munyakazi-Juru, ’06, of Kigali, Rwanda, easily advanced to the championship match at No. 2 singles but was beaten by Ripon’s Adam Bruno 5-7, 6-1, 6-1, for the title.
At No. 1 doubles, Arora and Munyakazi-Juru reached the title match and won the first set before Ripon’s Goerlitz and Bruno rallied to win 4-6, 6-4, 6-1. Brookfield’s Brian Hilgeman, ’05, and Beyler were the defending champions at No. 2 doubles and easily made it to the championship match but fell to Ripon’s Paul Vandenboogaard and Mike Sumnicht 4-6, 6-4, 6-4.
Baseball
Lawrence rebounded from a disappointing
Spring Break trip to Florida to finish
9-21 on the season and take third place in the North Division with
a 6-10 record.
The Vikings recorded impressive doubleheader splits with 2002 NCAA Division III World Series qualifier Lakeland College and the No. 18-ranked University of Wisconsin–Whitewater.
Five Vikings were named to the All-MWC North Division team. Leading the selections was pitcher Aaron Sorenson, ’06, who was named to the first team. Earning second-team honors were utility player Morgan Boltz, ’04, first base Chris McGinley, ’03, shortstop Jeremy Tollefson, ’03, and infielder Chad Zutter, ’03.
Sorenson, a right-hander from Sheboygan,
was the ace of the Lawrence pitching staff with a 3-1 record and
4.41 earned run average. Zutter,
a Colfax native,
led the team by hitting .327
during conference play and finished the season with a .316 average,
seven doubles, and eight RBIs. McGinley earned all-conference honors
for the
first time while
batting .354 with four homers and 15 RBIs. Boltz, a Kewaunee native,
batted a healthy .316 in conference play while serving as the designated
hitter
and seeing spot duty in the infield and outfield.
Tollefson, a native of Middleton, was named to the all-conference team for the third time. An all-conference selection in 2000 and in 2002, he batted .302 with six doubles, four homers, and a team-high 20 RBIs. jva