Paczosa completes standout college career

At Buffalo Grove High School, Kristin Paczosa starred in volleyball and basketball.

Not much changed in her four-year of playing sports at Cornell College in Mount Vernon, Iowa.

She starred in both sports, there, too.

And it's finally over.

"It went by so quick," Paczosa said. "It seems like just yesterday I was wearing the orange and blue for Coach (Tom) Dineen and Coach (Courtney) DeBolt in that gym. I can't believe it's over already."

But being involved in sports at Cornell isn't quite over.

Paczosa is serving as the athletic trainer for the Cornell softball team this spring.

It's perfect training for what she would like to do in a professional career as a physical therapist. She is currently deciding where she will spend the next three years studying that field.

"This (softball trainer) is good experience working with the other trainers and seeing the athletes day in and day out," she said.

Paczosa has been one of the finest athletes in Cornell history.

This past basketball season, as a senior co-captain, she averaged 8.3 points, 7.3 rebounds, 2.58 assists, 2.08 steals and .75 blocked shots per game. For the second year in a row she led the Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference in rebounds.

She was also fifth in the conference in steals and minutes played, sixth in assists, seventh in blocked shots and 12th in 3-point baskets made.

For her career, she stands 11th in career points with 681, fourth in rebounds with 642 and she is one of only 4 players to score 600 or more points and 600-plus rebounds in a career.

In volleyball, Paczosa ended up No. 2 all time with 1,339 kills.

When she entered Buffalo Grove as a freshman, she never dreamed she'd ended up playing both sports for the next eight years.

"I was surprised I spent as much time on the varsity in both sports as I did at Buffalo Grove," she said. "It was always my dream to play college sports, but I was not sure if I was going to be good enough to compete at that level."

Paczosa, who suffered a sprained right shoulder during her freshman volleyball season and had a bout with mononucleosis her freshman year of basketball, certainly proved she belonged in the world of college sports.

Women's BasketballThe other senior on Cornell's roster is co-captain Charlotte Milas (Rolling Meadows), a senior co-captain who finished her career at Cornell College (Iowa) by averaging 5.7 points and 1.9 rebounds per game with 29 assists and 19 steals. For her career, the three-year starter stands 13th in career points with 608 and 9th in 3-pointers with 45.SoftballIn a 2-1 loss to Pacific, Northwestern senior second baseman Nicole Pauly (Palatine) accounted for the Wildcats' only run by crushing a towering home run over the left field fence to cut the deficit to 2-1 in the sixth inning.The shot was Pauly's fourth of the season and the 44th of her career, tying her with Erin Dyer (2006-09) for third all-time in Wildcat history.Men's basketballJeff Derr (Barrington) completed a four-year career at Gordon College (Wenham, Ma.) and was part of one of the most successful four years of basketball at Gordon. His teams went 81-29 with a 24-5 record this season, including a Commonwealth Coast Conference championship and a bid to the NCAA Division III tournament. Derr averaged 6.8 points and played in all 29 games, including one start.He will graduate in May with a business administration degree and a minor in economics.WrestlingElmhurst College's Charlie Curran (Hersey) earned All-American honors at the 2010 NCAA Division III Championships held in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.Curran (32-9) earned the first All-America distinction of his career by placing 8th at 149 pounds.After dropping his opening round match 9-8 to Luther's Jason Pyle in the final 15 seconds, Curran bounced back to score back-to-back wins in the consolation round and clinch All-America honors. He edged Lycoming's Isaiah Britton in the second round of the consolation bracket and then defeated eighth-seeded Emanuel Ajagbe of Delaware Valley 3-2 in the third round.SwimmingIllinois State senior diver Katelyn Prorok (Hersey) concluded her final day of competition at the NCAA Zone C Diving Regionals in West Lafayette, Ind. with a 44th-place finish on the 3-meter board last Saturday after placing 42nd on the 1-meter the day before.After a rocky start to her meet, Prorok earned a score of 186.15 on the 3-meter board and finished 44th out of 46 overall. Prorok's performance follows a 42nd-place score of 193.00 on the 1-meter board Friday."I'm very proud of how Katelyn competed," said Illinois State diving coach Phil Hoffmann. "She kept her head up and competed dive-after-dive and took the rest of the meet one step at a time. She treated the meet like she did the entire season, and I couldn't have asked for a better leader both in the classroom and in the pool. Katelyn has a very bright future ahead of her."bull; Joan Cullen (Maine West), a junior at Ball State, swam career bests in the 50 free (24.42), 100 free (53.30) and 200 free (1:57.78) at the Mid-America Conference championships at Miami University in Oxford, OH. Cullen was also a member of the 400 free relay which swam a season's best 3:30.73.Women's track and fieldSophomore Megan O'Grady (Maine East) is one of three student-athletes from Carroll University who earned All-America honors.O'Grady, an All-American during the 2009 outdoor season, finished fifth in the 5,000 meter run with a school record time of 17:05 at the 2010 NCAA Division III Indoor Track and Field Championships at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana.bull; Please e-mail items to jleusch@dailyherald.com.