April 30, 2007

Dominance
Our women's tennis team captured the Big Ten championship on Sunday with a 4-0 win over Michigan. They have now won an incredible nine straight Big Ten championships, tying the Big Ten record for most consecutive championships (with Indiana's 1987-95 run in women's tennis). A strong argument can be made that our women's tennis program is the most dominant team in Big Ten history. Not only have we won nine straight championships, but we have not lost a Big Ten match in over three years. The program's remarkable success is a great tribute to head coach Claire Pollard and the outstanding job she has done in leading the program. Senior Alexis Prousis deserves special mention for her role in leading the team this year and for her outstanding play against Michigan. The NCAA tournament field will be selected this week, and it is likely we will host a Regional on May 11-12. Our team is presently ranked fifth in the country, and our convincing win over No. 2 Notre Dame earlier this month signaled that we have a chance to do very well in the NCAA tournament this year.

Women's Lacrosse
Another team that has been dominant this year is our women's lacrosse team. After losing our opener to North Carolina, we have won 15 straight games to finish the regular season 15-1. This weekend we play in the inaugural American Lacrosse Conference (ALC) tournament at Johns Hopkins. We captured our fourth straight ALC regular season championship this year and will be seeded No. 1 in the tournament. Our team is presently ranked No. 1 in the country, and should earn one of the top four seeds in the NCAA tournament. If we are one of the top seeds, we would host NCAA games on May 13 and 19.

Softball
Our softball team closed out the Big Ten regular season in strong fashion this weekend (sweeping both Iowa and Illinois at home), finishing with a 15-3 conference record. We are presently ranked eighth in the country and will finish no worse than second in the conference. Ohio State is currently in first place, but has two games remaining against Penn State. If they lose one game to Penn State, we will be the regular season champions (for the second straight year) and host the Big Ten tournament on May 11-13. Either way, our team has had another outstanding season and has a good chance to host NCAA tournament action in May. We play a key doubleheader this week on Thursday at home against No. 13 DePaul, which will help determine NCAA seeding.

NFL Draft
We did not have any football players drafted this year, but Marquice Cole (Raiders), Ryan Keenan (Giants) and Nick Roach (Chargers) all signed free agent contracts immediately following the draft. We wish them the best as they start their professional careers.