Fall Se­mes­ter Sports Re­cap

MISHAWAKA—From na­tional ti­tles to mi­nor im­prove­ments, the ath­letic de­part­ment saw a wide spread of suc­cesses this fall. Young pro­grams saw ma­jor im­prove­ments, and sto­ried pro­grams saw their his­tory get even deeper. 

“First of all, com­pet­i­tively I thought it has been a re­ally good se­mes­ter,” Bethel Ath­letic Di­rec­tor, Tony Na­tali, said. “Our vol­ley­ball team did great; they were the only team to beat Mar­ian. Men’s Soc­cer won the reg­u­lar sea­son and post­sea­son tour­na­ments in the Cross­roads League. Wom­en’s Soc­cer made tremen­dous im­prove­ment this year. Our cross-coun­try teams went to NAIA Na­tion­als and had good show­ings. All fall sports have had good show­ings.” 

The biggest ac­com­plish­ment that the fall sports teams had was a wom­en’s golf na­tional ti­tle in the NC­CAA Na­tional Cham­pi­onships. The ti­tle is the first in their pro­gram’s his­tory. In­cluded in that per­for­mance is an in­di­vid­ual na­tional cham­pi­onship that came in the form of Jes­sica Shurety. She fin­ished the tour­na­ment with a score of nine-over. 

“That was awe­some for them,” Na­tali said. “It’s the first time they’ve won one. Coach Hess has done an amaz­ing job and has for many years. So, for him to step into that role late this year and still win a na­tional cham­pi­onship is huge for them.” 

Next up for ac­com­plish­ments for the ath­letic pro­gram was a reg­u­lar sea­son and post­sea­son ti­tle for men’s soc­cer in the Cross­roads League. Coach Thi­ago Pin­to’s team went 16-5-2, which in­cluded a five-game win­ning streak to start their Cross­roads League cam­paign. They de­feated Spring Ar­bor, Mar­ian and In­di­ana Wes­leyan to win the post­sea­son tour­na­ment. 

“It’s not easy to win both of those,” said Na­tali. “To do so is re­ally im­pres­sive, and our con­fer­ence is al­ways very strong. The reg­u­lar sea­son ac­tu­ally, in my opin­ion, is harder to win be­cause that’s a long sea­son.” 

The next sport that has started to bring home some hard­ware in its young pro­gram is the es­ports team. This se­mes­ter, the Over­watch team was able to bring home the pro­gram’s first con­fer­ence ti­tle in the Great Lakes Es­ports Con­fer­ence (GLEC). 

“That’s a new team for us,” Na­tali said. “It’s only a cou­ple of years old. Coach Dan Wort has done a fan­tas­tic job for us. We’re ex­cited about where we are headed in that di­rec­tion, and to win a con­fer­ence cham­pi­onship al­ready is ex­cit­ing.” 

An­other area that saw im­prove­ments is the cross-coun­try teams. Over the course of the sea­son, the teams con­tin­u­ously got quicker. The men were able to qual­ify for the NC­CAA Na­tional Tour­na­ment and fin­ished sec­ond in the meet. Se­nior Trevor Miller fin­ished in the top ten in­di­vid­u­ally, and was able to set his per­sonal record (PR), as well as be named an NC­CAA All-Amer­i­can. As for the women, they also qual­i­fied for the NC­CAA Na­tional Tour­na­ment and were able to fin­ish third. Just like Trevor Miller for the men, ju­nior Megan Cooper fin­ished in the top ten in­di­vid­u­ally, set her PR and was named a NC­CAA All-Amer­i­can. 

“I think they got bet­ter through the course of the year,” Na­tali said. “They are both very young, but the fact that the men could fin­ish run­ner-up showed tremen­dous amounts of im­prove­ment through­out the year. The women also fin­ished third, and that’s a great ac­com­plish­ment.” 

Lastly, wom­en’s vol­ley­ball went 29-11 and qual­i­fied for both the NAIA and NC­CAA Na­tional Tour­na­ments. The team was able to win a game at the NC­CAA Na­tional Tour­na­ment against Warner Uni­ver­sity in straight sets. Even though it was not the fin­ish to the sea­son that they might have hoped for, they were still able to con­tinue to build off last sea­son’s NC­CAA Na­tional Cham­pi­onship run. 

For more in­for­ma­tion on Bethel Ath­let­ics visit www.bupi­lots.com.