April 27, 2009

CEDAR RAPIDS, IOWA . . . The Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (IIAC) announced today that Wartburg College track athlete Faith Burt (Cedar Falls, Iowa/Cedar Falls) and Cornell College baseball player Ryan Fincham (Englewood, Colo./Englewood) have been named the IIAC Female and Male Athletes of the Week for the period ending Sunday, April 26. The Conference also announced the Performers of the Week for the six sports in competition during the week.

Women’s Outdoor Track & Field – Faith Burt, Wartburg College, Cedar Falls, Iowa/Cedar Falls
Burt, a freshman, posted four top-3 efforts in four events over the weekend. She was part of both of Wartburg’s first Drake Relays event champions as a member of the winning 4x400 (3:44.24) and sprint medley (3:58.87) relays. Burt also ran on the third-place 4x100 relay (47.78 finals /46.77 prelims). The Wartburg 4x100 and 4x400 relays each surpassed NCAA Division III automatic qualifying standards. The 4x100 preliminary time was a Wartburg school record and is currently the top time in Division III. Burt also placed second in the 100-meter dash (12.87) at the Simpson College Kip Janvrin Open Friday night. (IIAC Female Athlete of the Week)

Baseball – Ryan Fincham, Cornell College, Englewood, Colo./Englewood
Fincham, a junior outfielder, hit. 611 with eight RBI, three doubles, and a home run as the Rams more than doubled their season win total with a 5-0 record during the week. He also hit a sacrifice fly, scored five times, and made 12 putouts in the field. (IIAC Male Athlete of the Week)

Softball – Amy Hanse, Coe College, Marion, Iowa/Linn-Mar
Hanse, a senior first baseman, belted her 10th and 11th career home runs in her final game at Clark Field, leading the Kohawks to a 4-0 record during the week. She hit .500 with 10 RBI, two doubles and two home runs during the week and was perfect in 22 chances in the field.

Men’s Outdoor Track & Field – John Kuckelman, Wartburg College, Keokuk, Iowa/Keokuk
Kuckelman, a senior, set a school record with his fourth-place toss of 172 feet, 8 inches in the hammer throw at the Loras Duhawk Open. He bettered the old Wartburg mark of 169-7 by more than three feet and surpassed the NCAA Division III provisional qualifying standard.

Men’s Tennis – Thomas Orser, Luther College, Keller, Texas/Keller
Orser, a senior, went 4-0 in Luther wins over regionally-ranked Wis.-Eau Claire (No. 16) and Grinnell (No. 9). He won a pair of straight-set victories at No. 4 singles to move to 20-6 on the year. He also teamed with Utsab Rijal or a pair of wins at No. 2 doubles. The pair is 8-0 this season.

Men’s Golf – Paul Soener, Luther College, Des Moines, Iowa/Roosevelt
Soener,a sophomore, holds the 36-hole lead after the first weekend of the 2009 Iowa Conference Men’s Golf Championship after firing back-to-back 1-over-par 73s for 146 total at Finkbine Golf Course in Iowa City. He leads the medalist race by two strokes.

Other Outstanding Weekly Performers
The IIAC also recognized the following outstanding athletic performances from the past week.

• Baseball – Coe College junior first baseman Pat Richmond (Algonquin, Ill./Dundee-Crown) hit .571 in 21 at-bats with a home run and three doubles. He committed just one error in 62 fielding chances as the Kohawks posted a 4-2 record which included Coe’s first doubleheader sweep of Wartburg in 15 years.

• Baseball – Loras College junior pitcher Kyler Laurie (Elgin, Ill./Burlington Central) earned three wins on the mount as the Duhawks went 5-0 and moved into first place in the league standings. He struck out 10 and allowed three earned in 10 2/3 innings pitched. Laurie also made one plate appearance during the week, drawing a walk in the eighth inning of the series opener against Simpson. He was lifted from the game in favor of a pinch runner who eventually tallied the game-winning run.

• Baseball – Luther College senior pitcher Adam Kohls (Hampton, Iowa/Hampton-Dumont) pitched complete-game wins over both Buena Vista and Coe to move his pitching record to 6-3, striking out 14.

• Softball – Buena Vista University freshman pitcher Chancey Wilcke (Battle Creek, Iowa/Battle Creek-Ida Grove) pitched the Beavers to their first two IIAC wins of the season in a doubleheader sweep of Dubuque. In the opener, she pitched a complete-game, 11-inning shutout, striking out nine. She then worked 2 1/3 innings of scoreless relief in game two as the Beavers came from behind to complete the sweep.

• Softball – Central College sophomore first baseman Katie Tenboer (Morrison, Ill./Morrison) hit. 538 with 10 RBI, a double and two home runs as the Dutch went 4-0 during the week and captured their 10th Iowa Conference softball title.

• Softball – Wartburg College sophomore outfielder Tina Vande Hoef (Ocheyedan, Iowa/Sibley-Ocheyedan) hit .533 and slugged .733 as the Knights posted a 4-1 record during the week and wrapped up the No. 2 seed for the Iowa Conference Tournament.

• Men’s Tennis – University of Dubuque sophomore Claudio Giraldi (Rome, Italy/Shape American) posted a 2-1 record at No. 1 singles during the week with wins in duals against Loras and Wartburg, completing the IIAC season undefeated at No. 1 singles, the first UD player to sweep through league play since Jeff Benson won individual titles in 1979 and 1980. He has won 11 of his last 13 matches and has a 20-6 record at No. 1 singles.

• Men’s Outdoor Track and Field – The Buena Vista University 4x200-meter relay team of Shawn Olorundami (Sr., Sioux City, Iowa/West), Tanner Russ (Jr., Hospers, Iowa/MOC-Floyd Valley), Justin Bauer (Sr., Willey, Iowa/Carroll Kuemper), and Eric Bertelsen (Sr., Polk City, Iowa/North Polk) finished third overall at the Drake Relays in a time of 1:27.40, one-tenth of a second shy of the BVU school record. The Beavers finished behind Division II track power Lincoln (Mo.) and Oklahoma Baptist.

• Men’s Outdoor Track and Field – The Loras College 4x800-meter relay team of Ray Orris (Sr., Dubuque, Iowa/Senior), Cody Dreyer (Jr., Elkader, Iowa/Central), Alex Eischeid (Sr., Bellevue, Iowa/Marquette), and Mark Sulkin (So., Elmhurst, Ill./York) broke Loras’ 21-year old school record with a 7:42.11 clocking at the Drake Relays.

• Women’s Outdoor Track and Field – The Loras College distance medley relay team of Tara Kilburg (So., LaMotte, Iowa/Andrew), Laura Rieger (So., Minneapolis, Minn./Academy of Holy Angels), Hannah Weiss (Jr., Dallas Center, Iowa/Dowling Catholic), and Mary Bridget Corken (Sr., Dubuque, Iowa/Wahlert) placed second at the Drake Relays with a school-record time of 12:00.31.

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