Four Swarthmore Squads Playoff-Bound This Weekend
It promises to be an exciting weekend for Garnet fans as four teams are headed to the playoffs in their respective sports. The men's tennis team will host NCAA Division III Tournament action for the second time in three years, women's tennis travels to Virginia for a fifth consecutive NCAA appearance, while the softball and track & field squads hit the road on their quest for a Centennial Championship.
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| Swarthmore freshman Willy Nolan has won eight straight matches in 2006-07. |
The rich tradition of Swarthmore men's tennis--four national titles, 30 NCAA appearances in 31 seasons, quarterfinals appearance in 2006--continues at the Edwin Faulkner Tennis Courts on May 4-6 with the first three rounds of the 2007 NCAA Division III Team Championship. The Garnet (6-9), led by senior Jon Reiss, the fourth-ranked singles player in the Atlantic South region, received a first-round bye and will face the College of New Jersey on Saturday, May 5 at 1:30 p.m. The Lions (11-2) downed Swarthmore 8-1 on April 6 in Ewing, N.J.
Alvernia College (8-1) and Baruch College (11-4) face off in first round action on Friday, May 4 at 3:00 p.m., with the winner advancing to face third-ranked Emory University (14-7) in the first second-round match on Saturday at 11:00 a.m. The final tennis match of the weekend will take place on Sunday, May 6 at 12:00 p.m. with the winner advancing to the quarterfinals to be played on May 15-20 at Washington University in St. Louis. Click here for the complete bracket.
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| Sonya Reynolds '07 was selected for the NCAA Division III Individual Championship for the third time. |
The Garnet women battled through un-timely injuries in 2006-07 to receive a fifth-consecutive invitation to the NCAA Division III Tournament. Swarthmore (12-6) is currently ranked 17th in the country and will be led by two-time All-America senior Sonya Reynolds. The Garnet travel to Lexington, Va. on Friday, May 4 to face Cabrini (12-4) at 10:00 a.m. Host Washington & Lee University (20-1) will face the winner of Friday's first-round affair on Saturday, May 5 in a 10:00 a.m. match. Click here for the complete team bracket.
Reynolds also received her third consecutive invitation to the NCAA Individual Championships. The individual championships include 32 single players and 16 double teams. The singles and doubles championships will be held May 18-20 at the University of Mary Washington Battleground Complex hosted by the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Va. Reynolds is the lone representative from the Centennial Conference in the singles' competition and will look to join Anjani Reddy '04 as the only two-time All-America singles' players in Swarthmore women's tennis history. (Reynolds is already All-America in doubles' with classmate Sara Sargent after winning the Wilson ITA Southeast Regional in the fall).
After an exciting sweep of McDaniel last Sunday resulting in a school-record 11 conference wins, the Swarthmore softball team will be the #2 seed in the Centennial playoffs, to be hosted by Ursinus in Collegeville, Pa. The softball tournament is run differently from most Centennial tourneys--it is a double-elimination event in which each team will play at least two games.
Swarthmore will open up against Gettysburg on Saturday morning at 10:00 a.m.; the Garnet swept the Bullets 3-1 and 9-6 on April 14. The Garnet will then play one more game on Saturday against either Ursinus or Dickinson. Three teams will advance to Sunday's action, which also gets going at 10:00 a.m. Click here for championship web site.
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| Captain Kelly Siano '07 crushed a home run in last year's Centennial playoffs. |
Swarthmore's outdoor track & field teams will get to sleep in their own beds at night as the 2007 Centennial Championships will be contested over on the Main Line at Haverford College. The three-day event gets going with a limited schedule on Friday; the Garnet will enter contestants in the meet-opening pole vault competition and the evening 10k races.
Largely devoted to trials, Saturday will be highlighted by the long jump and steeplechase events. In the men's long jump, slated for 11:00 a.m., Garnet freshman Matt Turner will compete for the title; his jump of 21-8 3/4 is the second longest by a Centennial athlete this year. Two Swarthmore runners--juniors Ross Weller and Jon Shoop--respectively hold the 3rd and 5th fastest times in the conference this year. Weller took home a bronze medal in last year's steeplechase championships. On the women's side, sophomore Cait Mullarkey's 11:42.42 in the steeplechase is the third-best CC regular-season time.
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| Ross Weller '08 won the 5,000 at the Danny Curran on April 2, posting an all-time top-ten time at Swarthmore. |
Most of the points may be scored in Sunday's final heats. For the women, Mullarkey currently holds the third-fastest CC time in the 400 hurdles (set for 1:40 p.m.) and the sixth-fastest time in the 800m (1:20 p.m.). Senior Sam Graffeo will look to reprise her 2005 silver medal-winning performance in the shot put at 1:00 p.m.
On the men's side, senior Vernon Chaplin will look to build on his season-low time in the 1,500 meters last weekend and score points in the event for the third straight year (including a bronze medal in 2005). Turner will look to score points in the triple jump (11:00 a.m.), and the perennial-strong Garnet relay teams are sure to provide excitement towards the end of the meet. Click here for the championship web site.