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Vernon Hills' Williams strides toward Augustana

At the high school level, Rob Williams has been a success on water and land.

He plans to stay on land for his collegiate career.

The Vernon Hills senior has announced he will continue his running career as a member of coach Paul Olsen's Augustana cross country and track and field programs.

The 5-foot-8, 152-pound Williams was a four-year letter winner in track and cross county for coach Mark Whitney at Vernon Hills. He was also a four-year letter winner in coach Adam Lueken's Vernon Hills' swimming program.

In cross country, Williams ran a 15:40 this past fall at the IHSA Class 2A state meet, finishing 66th individually and helping the Cougars to a seventh-place team finish.

As a junior, he also ran 15:40 at state, taking 40th place as Vernon Hills claimed third in Class 2A.

He was a two-time All-North Suburban Conference performer.

In track, Williams qualified for state with the Cougar 4x800 relay team as a junior. His personal bests include a 10:18 at 3200 meters, 4:38 in the 1600 and 2:07.65 at 800 meters.

A National Honor Society member, Williams also earned honorable mention on the IHSA state all-academic team.

He was a five-time North Suburban Conference all-academic honoree and is planning on history and secondary education majors at Augustana.

Williams will join a Viking track and field program that owns 16 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin outdoor titles.

Twelve have come under Olsen, who has also guided his teams to 14 top ten national finishes, including fifth in 2014.

Olsen also heads the Augustana cross country program, which has earned 11 top ten national finishes under his guidance.

In December of 2013, Olsen was inducted into the United States Track & Field and Cross-country Coaches Association Hall of Fame. He was that organization's Division III National Coach of the Year in 2008.

Women's track and field

The U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA) announced on Monday (May 11) that Lewis University junior Amber Cook (Warren Township) and senior teammate Amy Polhemus (Lake Zurich) were among the Flyers selected to the USTFCCCA All-Midwest Region Team for the 2015 Division II women's outdoor track and field season.

The top five individuals in each event from the Midwest earned the All-Region Honor, including each member of the region's top three relay teams.

"It's nice to see our athletes being recognized for the hard work they put in," said Lewis women's track and field coach Dana Schwarting. "We are in one of the most competitive regions so the award really means a lot to the athletes and coaching staff."

Cook claimed the top spot in the Midwest region in the triple jump with a NCAA Provisional and school-record leap of 12.13m (39-9¾).

Polhemus is part of Lewis' 4x400 relay team that broke the school-record and set a NCAA provisional mark with a first-place time of 3:45.47, tops in the Midwest region.

Polhemus set a season-best and NCAA Provisional mark of 1:01.65 in the 400-meter hurdles at the GVSU Last Chance Meet, which was good enough to claim the fifth spot in the Midwest.

Rugby

In an Illinois Tier One quarterfinal match, the seventh-seeded Arlington Stallions overcame a 23-7 halftime deficit to eliminate No. 2 Neuqua Valley Wildcats 33-26 in Naperville.

After several first half defensive lapses, the Stallions regained their composure at halftime and played a controlled and patient second half which allowed them to put up 3 tries in the final ten minutes of play.

It was capped by the match decider, a 40-meter break by center Zach Kaminski (Prospect) with a minute remaining to break a 26-26 tie.

Other Stallions try scorers were Spencer Krueger (Hersey), Ben Hischman (Stevenson), Alex Gountanis (Prospect) and Aiden Williams (Prospect).

"The Stallions had worked toward this end for some time," said coach Paul Bergman. "We have focused our development on flair, pace, consistency and conditioning.

"Up until now, we have struggled to get all those things right in the same game. They did and their timing couldn't have been better."

The Stallions will play East Division Champion and No. 3 seed New Trier on Thursday for the chance to play for the Illinois Rugby state championship in Rockford on Memorial Day. Match details can be found at www.arlingtonstallionsrugby.com.

• Please email Sports Notes items to jleusch@dailyherald.com..

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