Fremd grad Koeneman finishes with flourish for Carthage
Former Fremd Vikings star Jeff Koeneman, the all-time leader in pass receptions for Carthage College's football team, went out in style Saturday afternoon.
The final catch of the senior wide receiver's career was a 21-yard touchdown pass with 39 seconds left that gave Carthage the lead for good in a 35-30 win at Wheaton College.
Koeneman finished the game with 14 catches - 1 shy of Rob Garnes' 2000 school record - for 134 yards.
Koeneman caught a school season-record 94 passes, and the last one of his career-record 258 enabled Carthage to cap a 7-play, 60-yard drive that took 1:06.
• Joe Busse (Fremd) also finished his career at Carthage. A co-captain of the defense, Busse was the leading tackler this fall with a total of 58, including 40 solos and 18 assists.
Carthage ended the season with a three-game winning streak, finished 7-3 and 4-3 - tied for third in the College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin.
• Eric Jensen (Hersey), a senior cornerback for the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, had an interception against Wisconsin-Stout and a fumble recovery against Wisconsin-Oshkosh.
Volleyball
In a 3-0 win over the University of Connecticut, Cincinnati junior Annie Fesl (Hersey) put together an impressive all-around performance by dishing out 30 assists while adding 3 aces and 6 digs.
The 30 digs moved Fesl over the 4,000-assist plateau for her career, making her just the third Bearcats player to reach that milestone.
• For the seventh time this season, Kyrsten Becker (Rolling Meadows) of the University of St. Francis, scored a triple double. This time it came in the CCAC Conference championship against Olivet-Nazarene.
Becker had 11 kills, 10 digs and led the team with 32 serve receives and only 2 errors.
She earned second-team all-conference honors for the second year in a row as USF finished with a 27-16 record, 8-2 in the conference.
• Five Carthage women's volleyball starters were named to the 2009 All-CCIW team.
Libero Katie Lundgren (Stevenson) was named CCIW women's volleyball player of the year and first-team All-CCIW for the second-straight year. She averaged 5.96 digs per set.
Sophomore setter Drewann Pancratz (Schaumburg) was named second-team all-conference. She averaged 9.34 assists per set with a. 291 efficiency.
Outside hitter Lauren Dembkowski (Hersey) earned honorable-mention All-CCIW honors. Pancratz and Dembkowski (. 219, 2.98 kills per set, 0.31 service aces per set) were both named second-team All-CCIW in 2008.
Carthage coach Leanne Ulmer, the former Stevenson boys and girls coach, was named CCIW women's volleyball coach of the year for the fifth time since 2002.
• Aurora University senior middle hitter Jill Smart (Grayslake) was selected to the Northern Athletics all-conference first team, while junior outside hitter Amy Reynolds (Schaumburg) was named NAC honorable mention all-conference.
Reynolds averaged 2.30 kills and 3.59 digs per set and was named to the Monmouth College and Rose Hulman Institute of Techonology all-tournament teams.
• Carroll University junior Michele Leonard (Conant) has been named first-team All-Midwest Conference following a vote by league coaches.
Leonard was the only Pioneer selected among the eight first-team and nine second-team honorees.
The 6-foot middle blocker finished second on the Carroll squad with 196 kills and recorded nearly half (109) of the team's 236.5 total blocks.
The Pioneers finished the season 14-17 overall, 3-6 in the Midwest Conference.
• Kristin Paczosa (Buffalo Grove) completed a successful four-year career Cornell College (Mt. Vernon, Ia.) last weekend.
Paczosa ended up as Cornell's No. 2 career kills leader with 1,339 kills (3.01 kills per game), No. 4 in career aces with 162 and No. 5 in career digs with 1,110.
She also holds the distinction as being the only Cornell volleyball player to register more than 1,000 kills and 1,000 digs in a career. Paczosa holds the top spot for the most kills in a match (29) and most attempts in a match (71). She was named to three all-tournament teams this season and to the IIAC all conference first team.
She started her final basketball season last week.
Softball
Four members of the University of Buffalo softball team were recognized by the National Fastpitch Coaches Association (NFCA) for earning a 3.5 GPA or better for the fall and spring semesters.
The student-athlete must maintain a 3.5 GPA for the entire academic year.
Erin Zilka, Dana Carter, Jen Mongiovi and Kelly Cummings (Prospect) all earned the Girls Got Game/NFCA All-American Scholar award following the 2008-09 school year. Cummings earned a 3.61 GPA in the fall of 2008 and a 3.5 last spring. She played in 15 games for the Bulls, starting eight.
Men's soccer
• Lewis University's Sebastian Kieruzal (Hoffman Estates) has been named the 2009 Great Lakes Valley Conference freshman of the year.
Kieruzal helped pace the 17th-ranked Flyers to a 10-3-0 record in league matches. He allowed just 9 goals and finished with a 0.70 goals-against average, second in the league.
He also posted 6 shutouts and a 0.842 save percentage by notching 48 saves.
Men's cross country
Led by individual champion Michael Spain (Schaumburg), who toured the 8,000-meter (five-mile) course in 24 minutes, 17.9 seconds, North Central College proved it was the class of the NCAA Division III Midwest regional championships.
The Cardinals won for the second straight season, claiming a dominant win at Lake Breeze Golf Course in Winnecone, Wis.
The Cardinals scored just 21 points, with the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse being its closest competitor with 105 points.
Women's cross country
Senior Rachel Riske (Hersey) led Chicago Concordia College in the Division III Midwest regional meet in Oshkosh, Wis., with a 24:28.7 in the 6K, her second-best career effort and 24 seconds short of her school-record time set earlier in the season at an Oshkosh meet.
Certification
The National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) has launched a national certification program for interscholastic coaches with the Level 1 Accredited Interscholastic Coach certificate.
To become certified by the NFHS, a coach must take three required professional development courses online - Fundamentals of Coaching, First Aid for Coaches or its equivalent and a sport-specific course or Teaching Sport Skills - and complete an application online at www.nfhslearn.com. The cost of Level I certification is $50.
Coaches are encouraged to become certified for a number of reasons: to create a more educational environment and minimize risks for students, to stay current in the profession and to be nationally recognized - to name a few.
"Schools have many challenges facing them today, not the least of which is hiring coaches who understand their role in teaching life skills to students through the sport experience," said Tim Flannery, NFHS assistant director and director of the NFHS Coach Education Program. "This does not automatically happen. It must be intentional."
Flannery said when interscholastic coaches receive the proper training, they are able to provide their students with a well-rounded education applicable to life beyond the playing field, and the entire community sees the benefits.
"School administrators today must continually demonstrate the educational value of athletics to ensure the support of the community, and having trained coaches on staff is paramount to that success," said NFHS Executive Director Robert F. Kanaby.
• Please e-mail items to jleusch@dailyherald.com