http://www.columbiaspectator.com/authors/posts/31200 An authors posts... used for embedding en http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/48676 http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/48676#comments Sports Fencing Sat, 10 May 2008 13:40:17 -0500 Jonathan August 48676 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/31201 http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/31201#comments News Baseball Ivy League Champions Wed, 07 May 2008 15:47:22 -0500 Jonathan August 31201 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/55085 Team and individual success at every level of collegiate competition defined the 2007 season for the Columbia fencing team. The women's team went undefeated in the regular season against the toughest schedule in the nation, while the men's squad took home the NCAA Championship in March. As a whole, the Lions ended up with the bronze at the NCAAs, in addition to sophomore Daria Schneider's individual national championship in women's sabre. In a high-profile nonconference dual meet at NYU in late January, the Lions went a combined 9-1 against four of the top-10 teams in the nation, including a 5-0 day for the women's team. Of the five teams that Columbia faced at the NYU Duals, three eventually qualified at least 10 fencers for the NCAA Championships, with the early success at the lower Manhattan campus signifying what was to come for the Lions. After easily defeating three more teams in a tune-up for the Ivy Championships, Columbia began the two-weekend Ancient Eight competition. Week one saw both the men's and women's squads go undefeated against the lower-tier Ivy programs, leaving the Lions with the difficult task of traveling to Cambridge to take on defending men's champion Harvard and defending women's champion Penn. In what would be only the men's team's second loss of the season, the Light Blue fell to the Crimson by the narrowest of margins, 14-13, the same score as their loss to Ohio State at the NYU Duals. Still, a 4-1 Ivy League record secured the men a share of the Ancient Eight crown while the women's perfect 6-0 record earned them their first Ivy title since 2003. Six women's fencers made first-team All-Ivy League, as did five men, while two other men qualified for second-team honors. The Lions continued their success at the oldest collegiate fencing tournament, the IFA Championships, where the men's team took the title and the women came in third place after fighting off injuries suffered over the course of the season. Next up was the NCAA Northeast Regionals back in Cambridge, where, for the first time in the history of the program, Columbia qualified the maximum 12 fencers for the NCAA Championships. In fact the Lions qualified 16 fencers, but NCAA regulations limit teams to only six per gender and two per weapon. At the NCAA Championships in Madison, N.J., the Lion men capped off one of their best seasons in history by taking the national title for the first time since 1993. Columbia defeated Penn State by four points with a score of 93 and although only one member of the Light Blue earned a medal-freshman Kurt Getz with a bronze in men's foil-all six Lions earned All-American honors. After getting a lead from the men, the women could not hold on to the overall team title-by the end of the four-day competition, the Lions dropped to third place behind Penn State and St. John's. Still, three Lion women earned All-American honors-Schneider, junior Emily Jacobson, and senior Cassidy Luitjen-while both Jacobson an Schneider earned medals in the individual sabre competition. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/55085#comments Sports Sun, 06 May 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 55085 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/55032 The Columbia men's club lacrosse team took home the National College Lacrosse League Division II national championship on Sunday, defeating SUNY Cortland 10-6 in the finals. The Lions led the game start to finish in the championship match, jumping out to a 3-0 lead over the Red Dragons after the first quarter and never looking back. It was Saturday's semi-final contest against Lynchburg College, though, that was the more dramatic contest of the two. After taking an early 2-0 lead, Columbia allowed Lynchburg to tie the game at three goals apiece, and then let the Hornets grab a 4-3 lead going into halftime. Coming out after the break, the Lions surrendered a quick goal in the opening minutes, but rattled off five straight goals to take an 8-5 lead into the fourth quarter. Lynchburg would make a late comeback, however, scoring four consecutive goals to pull ahead 9-8 with only five minutes remaining. But the final momentum shift went in Columbia's favor as attacker Wesley Couture scored two goals in less than 45 seconds to put the Lions ahead 10-9 and goalie Dan Schmoor stopped two point-blank shots in the closing seconds to give Columbia the victory. "We're the type of team that when we see a challenge, we're going to attack it and put all we have into overcoming it," senior captain Anthony Blandino said. "After looking at our talent in the beginning of the year, we thought we could do big things and it's good to know that we did." Columbia finished the year with an 18-1 record and currently sits at number 36 in the national club rankings. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/55032#comments Sports Sun, 29 Apr 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 55032 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54979 Walking around the Columbia campus, it is generally easy to identify members of the football or basketball teams given their larger size and builds compared to normal students. For some athletes there is the unique opportunity to blend in with the crowd. But for Sara Ovadia, her days of staying below the radar are dwindling. The sophomore golfer stepped into the spotlight Sunday by taking home the individual Ivy League championship in addition to helping lead the Lions to their first team title in program history. The victory isn't all that much of a surprise given that the native of Santa Barbara, Calif., has risen to the number 40 ranking in the United States for women's amateurs in only five years of competitive golf. "I played in a lot of tournaments, more than most people would, to try and make up for not starting earlier," Ovadia said. "I really threw myself into it, playing around 10 tournaments in the summer and, having played in Europe, I have a lot of experience now, and that is a big help." Ovadia spent a large portion of last summer competing in France and England, including the British Women's Amateur tournament, where she was paired with defending NCAA champion Dewi Schreefel of the University of Southern California. Although Ovadia did not make it into the match play portion of the event, the experience of competing with the NCAA's best allowed her to learn about and compare her style of play. "She definitely hits it farther than I do," Ovadia said of Schreefel, "but I really didn't take much from the other players. I watched what she [Schreefel] did well and compared myself, but playing on a links-style course makes you change your strategy because of the terrain, so I was focused on that." Although it was her father Daniel, who played tennis at UCLA, who got Ovadia interested in playing golf at the age of 10 and paid for lessons, it was growing up with a family that routinely talked politics that played large role in why she ended up at Columbia. "My parents are both doctors, and it was definitely a really intellectual environment to grow up in," Ovadia said. "I wanted to go Berkeley or the University of Arizona, but after coming to Columbia, I realized that I wanted an Ivy League experience. I turned down scholarship offers from Tulane, for instance, but everyone was supportive." At Columbia, Ovadia tries to play down her status as an athlete to mix in with the rest of the student body. "It's kind of nice to blend in in the classroom, because I think the culture on campus is to take you more seriously if they don't know you're an athlete," Ovadia added. "I really just like to stay under the radar." On the golf course, however, Ovadia makes plenty of noise with her precision around the greens, stifling her playing partners who might have more power in their swings. "I have a pretty good short game and that tends to annoy people," Ovadia said. "When someone is on the green and is able to two-putt for par and sees that when I'm off the green, I chip it in, it can get frustrating for them. It's a good asset to have, especially in match play, because you can get inside their heads." Ovadia's athletic goal is to one day win the U.S. Women's Amateur and then go pro, but as a fallback plan is thinking of attending law school. For now, Ovadia doesn't mind keeping a low profile. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54979#comments Sports Wed, 25 Apr 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 54979 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54959 It isn't often that in one issue of Spectator, we are able to run two articles referring to Columbia as Ivy champions. It also isn't often that, in one year, Columbia can claim to have five Ivy title teams, but that is the case for the 2006-07 season. Of the Ancient Eight schools, only three reached the number five in terms of Ivy titles this past season, and given that those two other universities are perennial powerhouses Penn and Princeton, Columbia is in some elite company. Princeton dominated this year's athletic contests with nine championships already and the possibility for more. Currently, the Lions and Quakers are tied for Ivy titles, but Penn is in position to jump ahead in the overall title standings by the end of this month. But in contrast to the other five schools, no other Ivy has won more than three-although Cornell is well on its way to a fourth in men's lacrosse as the number-one team in the nation. One criticism that could be made concerning the titles Columbia has won this year is that they all come from smaller sports. Taking away the women's soccer championship would leave the Lions with Ivy titles in only men's and women's fencing, men's tennis, and women's golf. None of these four sports are major money-makers like football or basketball, but for an athletics department in the process of turning around a program that would consistently win only one or two championships a year, five is a significant number. The results of a successful season can yield dividends for years to come as the profile of the program increases. Athletics is one of the few ways alumni can stay in touch with their alma maters, and the more successful teams a university has, the greater the potential for new donors and supporters. Alumni are more willing to donate money to a winner than a loser, and those funds can be earmarked to build new facilities or renovate old ones. And I know for a fact that the soccer pitch at Baker is begging to be redone. More often than not, winning programs stay winners because athletes want to play for teams that they believe will end up at the top of the standings. Recruiting for an Ivy-title team is far easier than for a program sitting at the bottom, or even the middle, of the league table. Because they are able to attract better recruits, the teams that found success this season will have a leg up on their competition next year, making the chance for a repeat title all the more possible. The most important aspect of winning Ivy championships, especially at Columbia, is the possibility to change the apathetic feelings that many students have toward the athletics program. Many students follow their favorite professional sports teams religiously, but when it comes to athletics on campus, their sentiment is either neutral or slightly negative-generally for a good reason. Until recently, Columbia has succeeded in very few sports and in none of the major ones. Now, with five Ivy titles in hand and the potential for a fourth NCAA berth this weekend, the program seems to be on the right track, and the opportunity to draw fans is at an all-time high. In order to do this, however, these teams and athletes need to be marketed to the student population in a more effective manner. People care about teams that win and athletes with compelling stories, but when no one knows about either, fans can't exist. With five newly crowned Ivy champions, there is no better time to build the student fan base than now. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54959#comments Sports Tue, 24 Apr 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 54959 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54843 On Tuesday, Ibrahim Jaaber was presented with the Geasey Award, honoring him as the Big 5 Player of the Year. Being named the best collegiate basketball player in Philadelphia is quite an accomplishment given the city's competition, and it hasn't happened on the Penn campus since Tony Prince received the honor in 1979. To garner the honor, the defending two-time Ivy Player of the Year had to compete and succeed against top-flight talent in Villanova, an NCAA tournament team, and perennial Atlantic 10 power St. Joseph's. In addition, Jaaber had to beat out a projected late second-round NBA draft pick in Villanova's Curtis Sumpter-no small feat. He recently was invited to an NBA pre-draft camp, and while he will most likely not be asked to return to the more selective camp in Orlando, Fla., the option of playing overseas or in one of the NBA's development leagues is certainly a possibility. For any of us who were able to watch Jaaber up close, his dominance was obvious against Ivy competition in nearly every contest. Even when Columbia stopped Penn's run at an undefeated league campaign two seasons ago, Jaaber led all scorers with 24 points on 8-11 shooting. Although his selection as Ivy Player of the Year this season was debatable, there is no doubt that Jaaber had the largest impact on Penn's basketball program the past three years. Now, while it is somewhat unusual to see this level of talent in the Ancient Eight, it isn't unprecedented. Comparing Jaaber's play to that of an NBA legend such as Hall of Fame member Bill Bradley, Princeton '65, or an NBA champion such as Jim McMillian, CC '70, would not be a fair one. Still, there are players from the Ivy League who have found their way to the professional ranks either domestically or abroad-and succeeded. Currently 21 Ivy alums, male and female, are playing basketball around the world, albeit only one is in a major professional league in the United States-Allison Feaster of the WNBA. In baseball, the Ancient Eight sports 33 professionals, including four in the major leagues. The Ivy League has seen the most success of late in hockey, where an astounding 70 professionals have Ancient Eight roots. Of all the major professional leagues, however, the NFL contains the highest number of active Ivy athletes with 18, including Columbia graduate Marcellus Wiley. In a world where players are hyped for the pros while still in their first year of high school and Division I programs give athletes scholarships simply to play for one season, the Ivy League remains a unique conference that still attracts top athletes without having to hand out athletic scholarships. As a result, it is certainly the case that one is going to see many more players come out of schools such as the University of Miami or the University of Michigan, but that doesn't mean the Ivies have stopped producing a large number of professional athletes. The opposite trend seems to be occurring, in fact, as Ivy athletes are making a living for themselves in the professional ranks of 10 sports. While conferences like the Pac-10 and SEC get much of the national glory for the superstar status of their athletes in the pros, the Ivy League has continued to manufacture a steady stream of graduates into a field other than law, medicine, or business. For an eight-school conference whose emphasis is on academics and not athletics, I would say that 202 professional athletes is a pretty strong showing. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54843#comments Sports Wed, 18 Apr 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 54843 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54534 As a UCLA fan, saying that Saturday night's Final Four game was a disappointment would be an understatement. Watching the Bruins get crushed by Florida in the Final Four for the second year in a row and seeing UCLA continue to stall at 99 NCAA team titles yet again was more than just difficult to tolerate. Still, while my West Coast team has continued to struggle, things have been brightening here in Morningside Heights. Two weekends ago the Columbia fencing team, a perennial national power, finished in third place at the NCAA Championships after having taken both Ivy titles in February. The bronze trophy earned at the NCAAs was the highest result for Columbia since 1992-93 and while that is certainly the biggest highlight for the athletics program this year, it has been the Lions' other teams that have made the 2006-07 season one of the most successful in recent memory. The year started off with a bang thanks to the first Ivy championship in history for the women's soccer team. A close loss in the NCAA tournament to Connecticut ended the season, but the foundation for future success was set under long-time coach Kevin McCarthy. Football also triumphed this season with the program's first .500 season in a decade as first-year head coach Norries Wilson and his staff used their personnel's strengths to end the year with two straight Ivy victories. Transitioning into winter sports, Columbia continued its success most notably with the wrestling team. The Lions earned their first ever top-25 national ranking midway through the season and upset a ranked Penn team early in the campaign in Philadelphia. And despite a slow start to the Ivy season in men's basketball, Columbia finished at 7-7 in the Ancient Eight thanks to a three-game winning streak at the end of the season. For a program that has struggled in the past, how did the success of this past year come about? The answer is actually quite simple-coaching. Excluding Wilson, since this was his debut season at the helm of the Lions, all of Columbia's most successful coaches have been given the necessary time to build their programs-a rarity in collegiate athletics these days. The pressures of immediate success from students, alumni, and members of athletic departments around the nation usually result in mass firings when a coach cannot produce within the first few seasons. Not every program will be lucky enough to get a Ben Howland or John Thompson III where, in only three seasons, they can take their teams to the pinnacle of college basketball. That does not mean, however, that coaches who do not produce positive results instantly aren't leading their teams in the right direction, a fact that has not escaped Columbia's administration. What fans and athletic departments forget most of the time is that it takes more than just a year or two to institute new strategies, recruit players that fit the new system, and assess the talent left over from the previous regime. Despite two BCS appearances in his first two seasons at Notre Dame, there are already Web sites calling for Charlie Weis to be fired-a claim that sounds ridiculous, but is in fact all too common these days. I applaud Columbia for realizing this and not falling into the all-too-common trap of appeasing the masses when it is not in the best interest of the program as a whole. Keeping the trust of your coaches not only helps improve the entire program in the short term, but when coaches do move on in the future, the new hires can feel confident that they will be given ample time to implement the changes they see fit. For all the years of disappointment and mediocrity in Columbia's athletic history, understanding that coaches need time to fix is, at least in my book, the best remedy to overcoming past failures. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54534#comments Sports Sun, 01 Apr 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 54534 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54388 Columbia got some wood at the 2007 NCAA Championships, and although the event may not have ended up in a national championship, the Lions' third-place finish was the program's best since the field expanded to include all three women's disciplines. To cap off the tournament, sophomore women's sabrist Daria Schneider took the individual national title in a 15-11 victory in Columbia's final match. "It really was a tremendous team performance," head coach George Kolombatovich said. "I couldn't be happier with the way the team fenced. The women had a bad day one, but came back on the second day and competed really well. For all these fencers have been through, I could not be any prouder of them then I am now." The Championships began with a fast start for Columbia as the men opened up a two-point lead over eventual national champion Penn State at the end of day one. The men were led by the foil duo of senior Scott Sugimoto and freshman Kurt Getz, who would eventually tally 38 victories in 45 matches, the best record of any weapon during the four-day tournament. By virtue of their success, both fencers qualified for the four-person medal knockout stage. Although they lost their semifinal matches, including a 15-14 decision for Sugimoto, the two Lions were then pitted against each other for third and fourth place in the country. With a 15-8 victory, Getz claimed the bronze medal that was Sugimoto's just a season ago. It was Columbia who claimed the right to be called the best men's team in the nation at the conclusion of the men's tournament after Friday's action. The Lion men tallied a final score of 93 points, four better than Penn State, eight more than St. John's, and 11 over Ohio State and Notre Dame. Despite the fact that only one member of the men's team earned a medal, all six men finished as All-Americans. The men's sabre team that consisted of veteran seniors James Williams and Alex Krul saw Williams earn second-team All-American and Krul take the honorable mention title. The men's epee squad was, by contrast, a youth movement with sophomores Dwight Smith and Max Czapanskiy. Smith ended up qualifying for the epee knockout stage as the fourth seed, but lost both his matches to fall just short of the bronze medal. Smith qualified for first-team All-American and Czapanskiy earned honorable mention All-American. "You only get six men to compete with here and to have all six earn All-American status is just really incredible," Kolombatovich said. "For the men to go out and capture the team title like they did really showed me how strong and resilient a group this really was." Day three, which was the start of the women's round robin, did not see the usually consistent Lion women carry over the momentum the men started. The sabre duo of Schneider and junior Emily Jacobson proved to be the strongest in the country with 36 wins in their 45 round-robin matches, but the other weapons failed to keep Columbia ahead, as the Lions trailed by 13 after the third day of competition. Both Schneider and Jacobson qualified for the individual knockout tournament, and although Jacobson lost her first-round match, she rebounded with a 15-13 victory to claim the bronze medal. Schneider won her first-round in a pressure-filled 15-14 contest and then dominated number-one seed Caitlin Thompson of Penn State 15-11 for the individual title. "I felt pretty comfortable mostly because I felt I was doing everything I could, and I wasn't going to be disappointed in myself," Schneider said. "I fence individually too, and I think this is the next big step for me to do really well at World Cups and national tournaments. I've seen my fencing improve a lot this year, so I'm hoping that the changes I've been making will continue to help my fencing." Only one other Lion woman earned All-American status, and that was senior foilist Cassidy Luitjen, who took second-team honors for her eighth place finish. Fellow senior foilist Kathleen Reckling took 20th place with eight victories against the nation's elite. In women's epee, both senior Alexie Rubin and freshman Tess Finkel finished no higher than 16th place as Finkel battled injuries throughout the tournament. Kolombatovich knows that repeating or besting the accomplishments of the 2006-07 team will be extremely difficult as seven Lions who qualified for the NCAA Championships will be graduating. Columbia took the Ivy Championship on both the men's and women's sides for the first time in five seasons, with the women completing an undefeated team season. The Lions qualified the maximum of 12 fencers at NCAA Regionals for the first time in program history and then saw nine fencers earn All-American distinctions, with three medalists and an individual national champion. "I'm not just losing seven starters here today, I'm losing seven incredibly nice people, and unlike some other programs, they are all graduating," Kolombatovich said. "We had three other fencers qualify for this event, but couldn't come because of the NCAA limit, so that shows some of the program's depth. Even so, it's going to be hard to come back and top what we did this year. I'm incredibly proud, and it's a testament to how hard these fencers have worked." http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54388#comments Sports Sun, 25 Mar 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 54388 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54355 For the first time since 1993, the Columbia men's fencing team is national champion. At the NCAA Championships in Madison, N.J., the Lions took the men's crown with a total of 93 points accumulated over the two-day round-robin tournament. Columbia finished ahead of Penn State by four points, Notre Dame by eight and Ohio State and St. John's by 11. The men were led by the dominant foil duo of freshman Kurt Getz and senior Scott Sugimoto. Getz and Sugimoto combined for commanding 38 victories in their 46 round-robin matches and by virtue of their success, both qualified for the four-person medal knockout stage. Although they lost their semifinal matches, including a 15-14 decision for Sugimoto, the two Lions were then pitted against each other for third and fourth place in the country. With a 15-8 victory, Getz claimed the bronze medal that was Sugimoto's just a season ago. Despite the fact that only one Lion earned a medal, all six fencers finished as all-Americans. The men's sabre team consisted of veteran seniors in James Williams and Alex Krul, while the men's epee squad was, by contrast, a youth movement with sophomores Dwight Smith and Max Czapanskiy. Smith ended up qualifying for the epee knockout-stage as the fourth seed, but lost both his matches to fall just short of the bronze medal. In Columbia's quest for a combined team championship, the victory on the men's side gives the Lions an advantage heading into the weekend. The team championship will be determined by combining the number of points, or individual victories, from both the men's and women's teams. With Columbia's men providing a lead over its closest rivals, it is now the women's turn to prove why they were the only undefeated team in the nation this season. The women's round robin begins Saturday morning at the Simon Forum on the campus of Drew University. http://www.columbiaspectator.com/node/54355#comments Sports Thu, 22 Mar 2007 23:00:00 -0500 Jonathan August 54355 at http://www.columbiaspectator.com