College Achievers: Gronowski caps junior football season in a big way
South Dakota State quarterback Mark Gronowski (Neuqua Valley) earned a wealth of honors for his junior football season with the Jackrabbits, none larger than the one announced Jan. 6.
Gronowski was named the winner of the 37th Walter Payton Award, presented by Stats Perform and FedEx Ground recognizing the top offensive player in the Football Championship Subdivision.
He earned 18 first-place votes and 151 points from a national media panel, 58 points more than runner-up Max Brosmer, New Hampshire’s quarterback.
Gronowski completed 209 of 307 passes (68%) for 3,058 yards, 29 touchdowns and only 5 interceptions. He also ran for 402 yards, 8 touchdowns.
He ranked first among all FCS quarterbacks in passing efficiency, second in yards per pass attempt, tied for second in touchdown passes, third in points for which he was responsible, and seventh in passing yards.
On Jan. 3, the FCS Athletic Directors Association named Gronowski offensive player of the year.
The day after the 6-foot-3, 225-pound mechanical engineering student earned the Payton Award, he quarterbacked South Dakota State to a 23-3 win over Montana in the FCS national championship in Frisco, Texas.
Leading the 15-0 Jackrabbits to a repeat national title and third straight trip to the big game, in three seasons as starting quarterback Gronowski is 37-3.
Northern Michigan sophomore forward Molly Pistorius (Maine South) earned United Soccer Coaches first-team Division II Midwest honors. A second-team All-American this season — the highest honor ever earned by a Northern Michigan women’s soccer player — and the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletics Conference freshman of the year in 2022, Pistorius scored 14 goals with 4 assists for the 16-2-4 Wildcats. Those 14 goals rank No. 2 over a single season at Northern Michigan and made her the GLIAC offensive player of the year.
Another Hawks graduate, Katerina Mladenovic (Maine South), recently finished her freshman season as an outside hitter and defensive specialist for the St. Michael’s College (Vt.) women’s volleyball team. She recorded 151 digs and 24 aces to help the Purple Knights to a record of 6-13. That’s not earthshaking, yet it was the program’s best mark since 2015, after St. Michael’s won 7 matches in the last seven seasons combined. Mladenovic helped the Purple Knights qualify into its first Northeast 10 Conference tournament since 1995.
We’ll try to keep track of him as the men’s volleyball season progresses, but after four seasons as a starting setter at Lewis University, Kevin Kauling (Neuqua Valley) is now at the University of Hawaii. In 2023 Kauling played 18 matches at Lewis before an injury cut short his season. Now a graduate student, he did not play in the Rainbow Warriors’ season opener on Jan. 3. That was a 3-game sweep of Loyola-Chicago, which got a team-high 18 assists by sophomore setter Ryan McElligott (Mundelein).
Last week’s Great Lakes Valley Conference women’s basketball player of the week was Indianapolis junior Liv Becker (New Trier). Earning her second such award this season, the guard-forward scored 23 points on 58% shooting and grabbed 10 rebounds in an 83-71 victory over Ohio Dominican.
Also in the GLVC, in men’s basketball Lewis University junior guard Beau Frericks (Cary Grove) earned player of the week honors after the Flyers beat Lake Superior State 83-78 on Dec. 30. The 6-foot-1 Frericks, the 2020 captain of the Daily Herald Fox Valley All-Area Team, scored 22 points on 78% shooting from the floor.
Another athlete of the week, different sport... Early this wrestling season, Millikin sophomore Nathan Callaway (Marmion) trounced the competition at 157 pounds at the Big Blue’s own Open. It earned him the award for College Conference of Illinois-Wisconsin men’s wrestler of the week. Ranked ninth nationally at 157 on Dec. 15, Callaway went 4-0 with 3 technical falls and won his matches 19-2, 18-3, 15-3 and, in the final, 15-0. As of Jan. 5 his record was 16-2. Last season Callaway went 23-5 to earn Millikin’s award as newcomer of the year.