By: Regan Gubera, Contributing Writer
Photo collected by Nat Wilk
McKendree spring sports seasons are in full swing! Also, women’s bowling season came to a remarkable close, Men’s golf had their GLVC tournament and men’s volleyball took on Purdue Fort Wayne for playoffs all this past Easter weekend. It is my pleasure to review McK’s April sports highlights and happenings.
McK bowling has won the national title! This past Saturday, the Bearcats completely swept Stephen F. Austin 4-0 in the championship final. In Friday’s final four matches, McK faced elimination but on Saturday won three straight matches to land their championship final position. They kept up their competitive fire to epicly secure the national title. After such a fantastic bowling season, Hope Gramly (Sr.) was named Division II’s 2022 player of the year and is on the NTCA All-American First Team, Rebecca Hagerman (Jr.) was awarded Second Team, Maranda Pattison (Jr.) was Honorably Mentioned and Coach Shannon O’Keefe was awarded Division II Coach of the Year.
Men’s golf took on the first day of their GLVC tournament at 9 a.m. on Good Friday. For round one on Friday, the Bearcat golfers tied for third place as a team with University of Southern Indiana and Bearcats Fabian Wennerlof and Will Postlethwaite tied for fifth with 71 (-1) with even par at 72. Thomas Tollefsen and Rasmus Nilsson tied for 19th by scoring 72 (+2) and Vichitcharoenpaisarn tied for 28th by scoring 75 (+3). McK golf showed up for round two; they placed second as a team and Postlethwaite placed third, Nilsson and Wennerlof tied for tenth, and Tollefsen and Vichitcharoenpaisarn tied for 17th individually out of 45. For the final round 3, McK placed fourth, Postlethwaite tied for sixth, Nilsson tied for 12th, Wennerlof tied for 16th, Vichitcharoenpaisarn tied for 20th and Tollefsen tied for 26th.
For Men’s volleyball MIVA quarterfinals, Patrick Ross was elected for All-MIVA First Team and Francisco Comas, Ryan Serrano and Ethan Carroll were nominated for All-MIVA Second Team. The Bearcats’ fantastic season came to a close with a loss against Purdue Fort Wayne in four sets in their season’s quarterfinal match: 24-26, 20-25, 25-23, 22-25.
McK men’s tennis have started their season strong with a winning record of 15-2. This April they have won against WashU, UIS, Webster, Lewis, SBU and USI, with their only loss against UIndy.
McK track and field traveled to Greenville for a two-day Select Invitation on Friday and saw many personal bests. For the women: Brianna Sarver in the 200m finals got 26.75 and Laila Searcy in the 400m got 1:06.04. For personal bests for the men, Rodney Holas in the 3000m Steeplechase got 11:44.31, Seth Kasinger in the 1500m ran 4:17.11, Kai Toolie in the 110m hurdle finals got 16.27, Malachi Carroll ran 10.71 for the 100m and the 4×100 relay (Toolie, Walker, Bumpers, Carroll) ran 42.98 for a season best.
In the beginning of April, baseball Bearcats won three of four games against Rockhurst: 7-6, 10-5, 3-5, and 16-13. On April 9 in a double header against University of Missouri—St. Louis, the Bearcats started strong and won the first game 10-2 but lost the second 1-16. On Sunday they faced UMSL once again and amazingly bounced back to win a tight game 16-15.
Softball Bearcats started off April by beating Southwest Baptist University twice: 2-1, 5-2. For their other April games, they won one and lost one against the doubleheaders with Rockhurst, Missouri S&T and the University of Southern Indiana.
Congrats women’s bowling, men’s golf and men’s volleyball for such wonderful seasons! Spring sports are in the thick of their seasons and McK is excited to see where the hard work leads you.
