College Sports Roundup: EFSC Honors Student-Athletes

By  //  June 2, 2014

Eastern Florida Student-Athletes Earn Academic Recognition

BREVARD COUNTY, FLORIDA — Thirty-seven of Eastern Florida State College’s 143 student-athletes were represented on the President’s List, Honors List or Dean’s List for the 2013-2014 academic year.

Thirty-seven of Eastern Florida State College's 143 student-athletes were represented on the President's List, Honors List or Dean's List for the 2013-2014 academic year.
Thirty-seven of Eastern Florida State College’s 143 student-athletes were represented on the President’s List, Honors List or Dean’s List for the 2013-2014 academic year.

To qualify for the President’s List a student must earn a GPA of 4.0. Honors List students must earn a GPA of between 3.75 and 3.99. Achieving the Dean’s List requires a GPA of between 3.25 and 3.74.

Women’s soccer had the most players recognized, 11, and the highest average GPA, 3.25. All nine of the college’s athletic teams had players recognized. Two teams had average GPAs exceeding 3.0, women’s soccer at 3.25 and volleyball at 3.03. Eastern Florida President Dr. Jim Richey applauded their outstanding academic team achievement.

Student-athletes achieving President’s List status were Lindsey Pugh and Heather Welch for volleyball. Lynce Stalnaker and Victoria White achieved President’s list for women’s soccer. Ben Patrick for men’s basketball and Michael O’Sullivan for men’s soccer.

Achieving Honors List recognition were Gabrielle Jones and Sara Vicente for softball. Women’s soccer had three recipients Katlyn Bales, Jessica Fassnidge and Devin McAllister. Baseball recipients were Josh Smith and Austin Pereira and Sara Watkins for Volleyball.

Achieving Dean’s List recognition were Hannah Denny, Brooke Formby, McKenzie Post, Brianna Seaman, for Softball, Kaila Cochran and Isabella Sella for the Tennis team, Brittany Collison, Mariah Davis for Volleyball, Nicholas Maynard for Golf, Jessica Doyle, Alyssa Nesbitt, for Women’s basketball, Katelyn Kern, Amanda Lodge, Stephanie Martin, Jade Rhoes, Mariah Robbins and Kimberly Tierney for Women’s soccer, Manuel Goldberg and Ivan Santos for Men’s soccer, Nick Capra, Austin Leeney and Matt Yates for Baseball and Julian Adams for Men’s basketball.

Twenty additional athletes achieved a GPA of between 3.0 and 3.24.

The Panthers took down No. 15 Oregon State and No. 18 Syracuse for the second time in the regatta and beat No. 14 Penn. By placing third, coxswain Jessica Mellinger, stroke Jose Gomez-Feria, Ernestas Zarskis, Carson Green,Mindaugas Beliauskas, Kevin Coyle, John Martin, Andrew Konecny and bow Joe Horn are expected to rank among the top 15 crews in the country in the final national poll of the season. (Florida Tech Image)
The Panthers took down No. 15 Oregon State and No. 18 Syracuse for the second time in the regatta and beat No. 14 Penn. By placing third, coxswain Jessica Mellinger, stroke Jose Gomez-Feria, Ernestas Zarskis, Carson Green,Mindaugas Beliauskas, Kevin Coyle, John Martin, Andrew Konecny and bow Joe Horn are expected to rank among the top 15 crews in the country in the final national poll of the season. (Florida Tech Image)

Florida Tech Men’s Varsity Eight Finishes Third in Final at IRA Regatta

MEN’S ROWING — Florida Tech’s 20th-ranked men’s varsity eight ended its season with a third-place finish in the third level final of the Intercollegiate Rowing Association (IRA) Regatta at Mercer Lake on Sunday.

Jessica Mellinger
Jessica Mellinger

The Panthers took down No. 15 Oregon State and No. 18 Syracuse for the second time in the regatta and beat No. 14 Penn. By placing third, coxswain Jessica Mellinger, stroke Jose Gomez-FeriaErnestas ZarskisCarson Green,Mindaugas BeliauskasKevin CoyleJohn MartinAndrew Konecny and bow Joe Horn are expected to rank among the top 15 crews in the country in the final national poll of the season.

FIT finished just 1.8 seconds off 13th-ranked Stanford, which won at a time of 5:49.658. After finishing second to FIT yesterday, No. 17 George Washington just barely beat the Crimson and Gray for second place. The Colonials’ time was 5:51.057 compared to the Panthers’ 5:51.497.

Syracuse was fourth at 5:54.692. Penn was fifth at 5:55.036. Oregon State came in sixth at 5:59.622.

Jim Granger
Jim Granger

“The emphasis is always improving year to year,” head coach Jim Granger said.

“We finished 15th overall in this race. It’s a big difference to be competitive at the front end of the final than be six or seven seconds out of first place. I think the team took a pretty big leap in its competitiveness relative to some other programs that we want to be comparable to or beat. This weekend, they raced great the first and second days and put themselves in a position to have a good finish in the ‘C’ Final.”

Mindaugas Beliauskas
Mindaugas Beliauskas

The 24th-ranked second varsity eight closed out the season with a fifth-place finish in the fourth level final. CoxswainKatherine Hausrath, stroke Martynas MickusClay MathieuStrahinja MarkovicHank WalchAlec Bertossa,Andor DezsiNate Hodge and bow Marko Milovanovic crossed the finish line four seconds ahead of sixth-place and 20th-ranked Holy Cross at 6:06.626.

No. 17 George Washington won the race at 5:55.174. No. 12 Columbia was the runner-up at 5:58.305. No. 21 Hobart was third at 6:01.780. No. 22 San Diego nabbed fourth at 6:04.295.

“The first eight really achieved a lot of good things for the school and themselves this weekend,” Granger said.

“It was a really good experience for the second eight. You need to go through this once and there are six freshmen in that boat. Hopefully, they come back next year and have more motivation to move from a fourth level final to a second final.”

Sunday marked the final races for Beliauskas, a graduate student, and Bertossa and Mellinger, who both graduated in May. Looking ahead, Granger is aiming to further grow the team.

“We had two boats that were considered point-gaining boats for the overall trophy,” he said. “We have a couple of guys graduating and a lot coming in next year. We’re looking to be deeper and have a third varsity or fourth varsity competing at this regatta. That’s going to be a great day when we are competitive in those boats or however we break them down.

“Our boats want to see each other be competitive. For us, we’re going to work towards finishing higher at this regatta. Not only the first and second varsity, but all the boats we bring here. It starts in the fall.”