TRACK SOLID IN OPENER    

No team scores were kept at Saturday’s Knox Pentangular indoor track meet, but that didn’t stop the men’s and women’s track teams from turning in a strong performance.

“Overall, I was pleased with our performance,” said Roger Haynes. “It was a little better than expected. We had some people who hadn’t been scorers before really improve their performances.”

One area of improvement came from the women’s throwers who recorded one provisional qualifying mark and four personal-bests. Gloria Lehr recorded the season’s first provisional qualifying mark, winning the shot put with a distance of 42’9. Allison Renfroe placed third with a personal-best throw of 42’9-1/2 and freshman Amanda Streeter placed fifth in her first collegiate shot put competition with a mark of 39’0-1/4.

Streeter led a 2-3-4-5 finish for the Scots in the weight throw, tossing a personal-best 46’10-1/2, just two inches ahead of Lehr. Renfroe’s personal-best 43’5-3/4 placed her just in front of Maureen Dewan in fifth at 42’1-1/4.

“Amanda’s performance in the weight throw was outstanding,” said Haynes. That’s something for a freshman to be close to 48 feet this early. Gloria and Allison were very good in the shot and weight throw. It was a pretty good day for the throws group.”

Whitney Didier claimed first place in the pole vault, clearing 10’4. Megan McKenna was second at 9’10. Heather Hull led a 2-3 finish in the high jump with a mark of 4’9-1/2, two inches higher than Sarah Stinson and freshman Kaci Lierman who tied for third. In the jumps, Jae Moore turned in a “quality” start to the season with a fifth in the triple jump at 32’5 and Morgan Leffel placed fifth in the long jump with a distance of 15’9.

Moore took two firsts on the track, winning the 55-meters in 7.62 and the 200- in 27.64. Freshman Brittany Lowdermilk had a “good” first meet, placing second in the 55- at 7.74.  

Shannon Turczyn won the 55- hurdles in 8.76 and took third in the 200- at 28.35. Katey Vaccarello placed third in the hurdles with a time of 9.90.

Personal-bests by a pair of juniors highlighted the Scots’ 3,000-meter run. Running in her first collegiate track meet, newcomer Taryn Tang clocked an 11:28.94 for a second-place finish. Brianna Flynn’s personal-best 11:54.43 placed her third. Katie Staab ran to a third in the mile, clocking a 5:43.85.

In the relays, Lierman, Leffel, Vaccarello and Moore won the 4x200 in a time of 1:52.30. Didier joined Lierman, Vaccarello and Moore to form the first-place 4x400 team, finishing in 4:17.46.

“Kaci ran two very good relay legs,” said Haynes of the freshman sprinter. “She’ll be a good addition in the women’s long sprint relay races.”

The high jump highlighted the men’s field events where the Scots forged a two-way tie for first. Sean Wells and Tyler Hannam each cleared 6’5 in the season’s opening meet to share first place honors. Freshman Matt Hassler cleared 5’9-3/4 to tie for fourth.

On the track, Kyle Prout turned in a highlight performance in the 55-meters. The sophomore logged a personal-best 6.56 to win the event, just .09 off the school record. Saidu Seesay was second at 6.73 and Michael Blodgett was fourth in 6.79.

“Kyle knocked the time down pretty far,” praised Haynes. “He was just off the school record, so that’s a great performance for him in the first meet.”

Seesay led a top four sweep in the 200-meters where the top three were separated by just .13 seconds. Seesay clocked a winning time of 23.62, followed by Prout at 23.72, Blodgett at 23.75 and freshman Shane Reschke with a 24.10.

Jacob Stott and freshman Logan Weir placed 1-2 in the 400-meter run. Stott broke the tape in 51.35 and Weir ran a 53.63.

Clay Staley’s 4:30.03 was good for second in the mile run. Geoff Bird and Damon Bautista finished 2-3 in the 3,000-meters in 9:20.59 and 9:29.33, respectively. Scott Sheller’s 9:42.42 placed him fifth.

The men’s relays picked up a pair of firsts. Sesay, Prout, Ryan Hardman and Patrick Mundschenk teamed to run a 1:34.48 to win the 4x200. Reschke, Stott, Weir and Logan Hohl broke the tape in the 4x400 with a time of 3:28.82.

Brock McAnally continued the Scots’ tradition in the pole vault. The sophomore won the event, clearing a height of 14’4-1/2. Blodgett and Reschke finished 2-3 in the long jump with marks of 21’5-1/4 and 20’4-1/2, respectively. Nick Law was fifth with a leap of 19’8-1/4. Blodgett also placed third in the triple jump at 41’7.

The Scots finished 1-2 in the shot put and 3-4 in the weight throw. Peyton Lumzy’s shot put of 46’3-1/4 bested teammate Sam Cokinos’ mark of 45’9. Lumzy’s mark of 47’3-1/2 in the weight throw was just in front of Cokinos’s personal-best 46’6-3/4. Freshman Paul Terpening was fourth in the shot at 44’3-1/4. 

“We were pretty good in the field events with Cokinos and Lumzy in the throws,” said Haynes. “Brock had a good start in the vault. Blodgett was solid in the jumps and ran well in the sprints. Overall, a pretty good day for the men.”

Monmouth will host a five-team meet this Saturday at the Huff Athletic Center. Field events open the meet at 10:30 a.m.

CLOSING THE GAP

The race for the Midwest Conference tournament is getting pretty interesting on the women’s side – and the Scots are doing their part to add to that interest.

Last weekend’s games were not kind to the favorites. Previously unbeaten in the conference, Beloit fell to Lake Forest; Ripon – ranked seventh in the coaches poll – downed Illinois College; and Monmouth drilled then league co-leader Carroll.

So, what does all this mean?

In short, the bottom three – Knox, Grinnell and Lawrence – are out of the picture with six losses each. Everyone else is not only in the picture, they’re fighting to be in the front row. In order, it’s Beloit (6-1), St. Norbert (5-1), Carroll (5-2), Lake Forest and Ripon (4-2), followed by Illinois College and Monmouth (3-3).

The Scots’ weekend sweep and the renewed conference race had Melissa Bittner feeling a little better about life this week.

“I feel much better, especially after the Carroll game,” said Bittner. “I was just thinking ‘Get a win,’ but I’ll take a 20-point margin.”

That’s exactly what the Scots delivered, leading for all but the first 1:06 in the 86-66 win. Monmouth had three players score 20 or more – Tanesha Hughes poured in a career-high 30 with 10 rebounds, Melissa Gorski – the sixth-leading scorer in Scots history – added 26 points and 16 rebounds, and Lynsey Barnard added 20 – all in the second half. Do the math – that’s Hughes, Gorksi and Barnard 76, Carroll 66.

Come to think of it, Hughes and Gorski out-rebounded Carroll 36-24.

“Tanesha and Mitt were great,” praised Bittner of her two seniors. “They were difficult to stop and Carroll couldn’t figure out how to stop them. We knew Carroll was going to try and shut those two down and that left our perimeter open. Lynsey stepped up in the second half and that was the 20-point margin.”

The win boosted the Scots’ hopes of a postseason berth, something the team has been aware of for a few weeks.

“We’ve been telling the team that the Carroll game could very well determine our season,” said Bittner. We only play Carroll and Beloit once this year, so the winner will hold the head-to-head tie-breaker if it comes to that. Every season you come to a game or two that is the turning point. We’re hoping that was the turning point.”

The Scots will get a measure of where they stand when they travel to Beloit to meet the league leader Friday night and ten seems to be the magic number of wins to advance to the MWC tournament. With a 3-3 record, the Scots need to find at least seven more wins in their 10 remaining games.

“Beloit is our next big game,” said Bittner. “We traditionally matchup well with them and we want to focus on them, but we’re not going to take Lawrence lightly on Saturday, either.”

The Scots cruised to a 63-44 win last week over the Vikings, using 15 players and resting their starters for much of the second half. Even with a 30-11 lead at the break, Bittner wasn’t satisfied with resting on the first half success.

“We talked about ball movement at halftime,” reported Bittner. “Our defense was great, but we should have been scoring more than what we were. We were able to rest the starters in the second half and that was valuable for our game the next day with Carroll. We’ll have to be ready for Lawrence this weekend. Everyone is a different team on their home court.”

For this weekend at least, the Scots are putting the playoff picture in the background and focusing on the task at hand – win a game at time.

“It’s a whole jumbled mess,” said Bittner of the tight race. “There are seven teams fighting for four positions. We need to focus on a game at a time and take care of ourselves. It’s still too early to begin thinking about scenarios.”

Not to be lost in the playoff picture is the team’s free throw shooting. Averaging just over 70 percent for the season, the team is riding a streak of 23 straight. For a player to make 23 straight is quite an accomplishment in itself, and for a TEAM to make that many consecutive is equally amazing. A single player may get into a rhythm and develop the hot hand, but you’d think a weaker shooter – or simply anyone – would break that string, but so far five different players have stepped to the line without missing a charity toss, highlighted by sophomore Kim Howard’s 7-for-7 performance against Lawrence. Over that span, they’ve tied the single game percentage record – twice.

That may be a good omen for the Scots’ playoff hopes if they have to make their free throws down the stretch.

SWIMMERS SPLIT

The swim teams had mixed results in a dual meet last weekend at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology.

The Scots’ women posted a 131-118 win while the men fell 195-95. Monmouth’s women are 4-1 in dual meets, the best start in the history of the women’s program.

“Neither team was very focused for this meet,” reported Dave Yez. “The women had a little more focus, but the men just weren’t mentally ready.”

The women needed every bit of focus to pick up their fourth dual meet win, but it was the addition of diving that may have made the difference.

The arrival of a diving board over the holiday break allowed the divers to begin full training workouts and it paid dividends. A second and third place finish by freshmen Danielle Kita and Lindsey Masscho in 1-meter diving gave the Scots just enough cushion to hold off RHIT in the meet’s final race.

Leading by just four points, the Scots’ 400-yard freestyle relay team of Rachel Holm, Kendra Kuehl, Colleen Zumpf and Krysta Sparks won the event by less than .69 seconds (4:02.16). The foursome had opened the meet with a win in the 200- medley relay (2:05.23).

“We swam just well enough in the final race to win,” said Yez. “I feel like our two divers put us in position to do that by getting seven points for us in the diving well.”

Especially satisfying for Yez was the performance of Masscho, competing for the first time in her collegiate career. The freshman had practiced four dives, but needed a fifth in order to garner any points. That’s when Yez really became impressed.

“Originally, we were just going to have her do her four dives for practice and we just wouldn’t get any points,” explained Yez. “During the warm-ups (fellow diver) Jack Clifford and I had her try some different things she had never done before. She’s a quick learner and was able to do five dives.”

Five dives is nice, and when you figure she learned her fifth dive just minutes before the competition, that’s even more impressive – but…The competition judges SIX dives and Masscho didn’t have one in the “reverse” category – a requirement.

“We decided to have Lindsey make her five legal dives and we would take the sixth dive as a failed dive,” said Yez. “That gave her six dives and allowed us to pick up three crucial points.”

Let’s see, in the span of 15 minutes, Masscho went from a practice diver to third place, helping the Scots pick up the dual meet win. Not bad for a day’s work.

Speaking of a day’s work, the women’s swimmers recorded three personal-best swims. Jamie Schingoethe swam to a personal-best while winning the 50- freestyle (26.94) and would have had a win in the 100- freestyle if not out-touched by a tenth of a second. Rachel Buckham picked up a pair of wins, logging a personal-best to win the 200- backstroke (2:23.04) and winning the 100- backstroke (1:06.50). Kuehl’s personal-best in the 200- backstroke (2:24.77) placed her second to Buckham. Buckham’s 200- time vaulted her to fourth in the conference standings and Kuehl pulled into seventh.

Sparks took top honors in the 100- and 200- breaststrokes (1:13.23 and 2:38.27, respectively). Holm touched first in the 100- and 200- butterflies (1:05.52 and 2:25.78, respectively).

“Rachel (Holm) is a gamer,” praised Yez of Holm’s four firsts. “She gives it her all every day in practice and in every meet. Colleen is another hard-worker. She really sprinted to the finish in the 200- breaststroke and out-touched her competition for second. Rachel (Buckham) is becoming a standard first-place finisher and Lauren (Nelson) has been a good leader as an upperclassman. She works hard every day in practice and Saturday swam her best time in the 100- freestyle.”

There were no such dramatics in the men’s competition, although Andrew Wright logged a personal-best to win the 1,000- freestyle (10:32.95). John Kaiser took first in the 200- butterfly (2:07.43) and Harrison Heilman placed first in the 200- individual medley (2:11.48).

“We knew Rose-Hulman would do better against us in a dual meet because of their depth,” reported Yez whose men’s team defeated Rose-Hulman twice this season in larger meets. “If our guys were on their game, I think it would have been very close. We want to use this as a learning experience and finish the season strong.”

In the “strong” category, Yez praised Josh Van Swol for a good performance in the 100- backstroke, finishing second (1:00.08) and moving into the MWC’s top 10. Clifford’s 180.90 score in the 1-meter dive placed him fourth and was less than a point off his career-best for a six-dive competition.

“With not even a month of actual board training, Jack has come along quickly,” said Yez. “Our men’s team had a bad meet, but we think we can get it turned around by conference time.”

The Scots will get a sneak peek at one conference team this weekend – Ripon – when Monmouth hosts the Red Hawks and Coe this Saturday for a 1:00 p.m. meet at Monmouth College.

SEE WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU PUT YOUR MIND TO IT

Men’s basketball coach Mark Vershaw wasn’t very happy with his team’s performance in last Friday’s 90-63 loss to Lawrence.

Vershaw was so disappointed in the team’s performance that he substituted the usual shoot-around prior to an afternoon game with a Saturday morning practice. The result? A VERY close loss to conference unbeaten Carroll.

Maybe Vershaw should have a full practice the morning of every game. So, coach, what gives?

“The guys, from the starters to the last guy on the bench, decided THEY needed to raise their level of play and intensity,” said Vershaw. “Friday night we didn’t ‘just not play well,’ we played flat like we were not interested in the game.”

The Vikings set the tone early, jumping out to an 11-1 lead. The Scots weren’t able to make a shot from the floor until the 13 minute mark. The Scots did have one bright spot. Corey Turner poured in 18 points on 7-of-9 shooting.

“As bad as we were shooting, Corey gave us a lift,” said Vershaw. “He had to leave in the first half with an injury and it went from a 12 point game to a 25 point game with him out of the lineup.”

The good news – 20 Scots got into the lineup and all but six scored. Perhaps it was a wakeup call.

“Even with falling behind early, you’ve still got to raise the intensity, especially for a conference game,” said Vershaw. “I felt embarrassed by our performance on Friday. Fans want to see a team compete and play hard. If I were a fan, I don’t know if I would have come back for Saturday.”

Those fans who did return Saturday saw a completely different Scots team – and not in terms of players.

“If you compared a video of our bench from Friday to Saturday you would see they made the difference in the energy level,” praised Vershaw. “The guys played with more emotion. It wasn’t that much different shooting, although we shot better, it was more about playing much harder and that kept us in the game.”

Other than Zach Ott hitting the Scots’ first shot of the game, it sure started in much the same manner as Friday – trailing 10-2 just three minutes into the game. The Scots chipped away, closing to one, 14-13 on an Eric Grant layup midway through the first half. Carroll was nursing a 39-30 halftime lead when the Scots lit it up to begin the second half.

Corey Gruber hit a trey on the Scots’ first possession, followed by another Grant layup and an Alex Tanney bucket in the paint and suddenly, the Scots trailed just 39-37 after three possessions.

Quinn Wilkin’s 3-pointer with 14:27 left tied it, but over the next six minutes the Pioneers were able to regain a nine point edge and put the game out of reach, hitting 11 of 13 free throws in the final 5:15.

“We fought our way back,” said Vershaw. “We just couldn’t make enough shots down the stretch and couldn’t keep them off the line.”

Despite shooting 50 percent from the floor, the Scots couldn’t overcome the Pioneers’ free throw advantage – 26-of-30 for Carroll, 2-of-7 for Monmouth. The Scots were whistled for 26 fouls compared to 12 for the Pioneers.

“In most conferences, you expect that on the road, but we were at home,” lamented Vershaw.

Despite the two setbacks, Turner was impressive. After scoring 18 on Friday, the senior came back with a 17 point effort on Friday, matching Ott’s 17 points.

“Turner was a bright spot and Zach played closer to what we expected Saturday,” reported Vershaw of Ott’s 17 point, nine rebound performance. “He looked more aggressive offensively.”

While Ott began to show signs of things to come and Turner was on fire, Vershaw was quick to give kudos to Wilkin, too. The sophomore got his first career start in Saturday’s game.

“He did a nice job with his minutes on Friday,” explained Vershaw. “He made a great hustle play on Saturday to save a ball and hit a big three. That three to tie it gave us a chance, but we just couldn’t take advantage. He did a lot of nice things for us. He’s been a high energy kid in practice and when he got his opportunity Friday he made the most of it. I told him he would get another opportunity on Saturday.”

Monmouth travels to Beloit Friday night, then faces Lawrence in a rematch on Saturday and will meet Grinnell Tuesday in a special 5:00 p.m. game at the Wells Fargo Arena in Des Moines.

“We challenged our players,” said Vershaw. “In order to have success down the stretch of the season, we have to have better intensity in practice and carry that on to a daily basis. If we’re going to play this hard to be in ball games, we’re going to have to make free throws and not turn the ball over to give us a chance to win.”

Low turnovers could be problematic for the Scots Tuesday when they face Grinnell. The Pioneers force an average of nearly 30 turnovers per game. Adding even more concern for Vershaw is his team’s inexperience of facing the Grinnell system. More than half the Scots have not even seen the “System” in person.

“The returners and coaches are better prepared this year, but we still have a lot of new guys,” warned Vershaw. “You can watch tape and get first-hand reports from guys that have played against them, but you never know how the players will react until they’re actually in the game. That’s just how effective that system is. It makes coaches nervous, but it comes back to the same thing – take care of the basketball and make your layups, then you’ll have a shot.”

The Scots’ resolve will be put to the test over the next few days. Monmouth is in the midst of their toughest stretch of games this season, facing three of the conference’s top four teams four times in the span of five games.

HONORABLE PERFORMANCES

It was a good week for Fighting Scots athletes who won three of a possible eight Midwest Conference Performer of the Week honors in six sports.

In basketball, senior Tanesha Hughes (Peoria, Ill./Woodruff) had the best weekend of her career and earned the Midwest Conference Performer of the Week award.

Hughes helped the Fighting Scots to a 2-0 week to stay in the hunt for a conference playoff berth. The Scots beat Lawrence 63-44 on Friday and topped Carroll 86-66 in a crucial game on Saturday. In the Scots’ upset of Carroll, the power forward recorded her seventh double-double in 13 games. Hughes poured in a game-high 30 points on 13-of-21 shooting and ripped down 10 rebounds to go with a team-high five steals. That performance came off a solid effort the night before when Hughes nearly recorded the first triple double in Fighting Scots women’s history. In just 27 minutes against Lawrence, Hughes ripped down 12 rebounds, scored eight points and had eight steals. For the week, she averaged 19 points, 11 rebounds and 7.5 steals.

Hughes is averaging a double-double this season with 14.2 points and 10.3 rebounds per game.

On the track, the women’s team swept the season’s first Midwest Conference Performer of the Week honors.

Junior thrower Gloria Lehr (Knoxville, Ill./Knoxville) and sophomore sprinter Jae Moore (Peoria, Ill./Notre Dame) rose to the top at last week’s season-opening Knox Pentangular.

Lehr sent notice that she will be a force in the Midwest Conference, throwing a provisional qualifying mark in the first meet of the year while winning the shot put (42’9). She also placed third in the weight throw (46’8-1/4), just two inches out of second.

Moore got her indoor season off to a good start, picking up two individual firsts and running on two winning relays. Moore clocked a 7.62 to win the 55-meter dash and broke the tape in the 200-meters with a time of 27.64. She also ran a leg on the winning 4x200 (1:52.30), finishing nearly six seconds ahead of the second place team, and 4x400 (4:17.46), winning by nearly 15 seconds. Moore also took her talents to the triple jump where she placed fifth.

WEBCASTS REMINDER

A reminder for fans not able to attend Fighting Scots basketball games in person may watch the action on their computer by logging on to www.midwestconference.tv for live action with video and audio. The feeds are free.

THE WEEK AHEAD

Fri., Jan. 23
Women’s Basketball – at Beloit, 5:00 pm
Men’s Basketball – at Beloit, 7:00 pm

 Sat., Jan. 24
Track – hosts Monmouth College Midwest Invitational, 10:30 am
Swimming – hosts Coe and Ripon, 1:00 pm
Women’s Basketball – at Lawrence, 3:00 pm
Men’s Basketball – at Lawrence, 5:00 pm 

Tues., Jan. 27
Men’s Basketball – vs. Grinnell at Wells Fargo Arena, Des Moines, Iowa, 5:00 pm

Wed., Jan. 28
Women’s Basketball – at Grinnell, 5:00 pm

SCOTSIVATIONAL

"It takes the same things to go there (the Super Bowl) and lose that it took to go there and win. Everybody works hard; you have to find a way to work harder. Everybody works smart; you have to find a way to work a little smarter. Then you have to be lucky." – Dick Vermeil