Kalsey soars to win in pole vault for Westminster
Westminster junior pole vaulter Marissa Kalsey of was named Monday the Presidents’ Athletic Conference Women’s Field Athlete of the Week.
Kalsey, a former PIAA champion at Waynesburg, won the pole vault Saturday at the Jim Wuske Invitational that was hosted by Mount Union College in Alliance, Ohio. Kalsey cleared a season-best 12-6 to beat a field of 18 competitors. The junior All-American is tied for the second-best mark in NCAA Division III this season.
Kalsey competed last month at the SPIRE Midwest Indoor Track & Field Open in Geneva, Ohio, and placed 13th in a field of 44 vaulters.
Kalsey holds the Westminster indoor and outdoor records in the pole vault. She cleared 12-11½ last March to set the school indoor mark and established the outdoor record of 13-0¼ last May.
Brady Sheetz, a senior first baseman from Eighty Four, has been chosen as one of the two team captains for Hartford University.
Sheetz batted .288 as a junior with 10 doubles, three triples and 27 RBI. He also tied for the team lead with a .991 fielding percentage.
“True leaders who can effect change in others need to do everything right in order to be trusted and followed,” Hartford head coach Justin Blood said. “Over the course of the last three years, Brady has done just that. … He has been a model of consistency in the classroom, in the community and on the field.”
Hartford had a 31-23 record last year, including a 16-7 mark in the America East Conference.
Shawn Johnson has made an immediate impact in the Southeastern Conference.
A junior from Canonsburg, Johnson won the long jump in his first indoor competition with Auburn after transferring from South Plains Junior College in Levelland, Texas. Johnson won the long jump at the Auburn Invitational last month with a leap of 23-10¾.
One week later, at the Vanderbilt Invitational, Johnson established a personal best in the triple jump with a leap of 51-6½ to finish in third place.
Johnson finished third in the Class AAA high jump and triple jump at the PIAA Championships in 2012 while at Canon-McMillan.
• Freshman Alyssa Wise has the top five times for Pitt in the 60-meter dash this indoor season.
Wise, a Washington graduate, ran a personal best 7.59 to finish second in the Youngstown State Invitational. Wise won the 60 dash in 7.60 at the Nittany Lion Challenge hosted by Penn State.
• Alec Rideout, a freshman at Shippensburg, set a personal record in the shot put Saturday at the DeScriver Invitational hosted by East Stroudsburg.
Rideout, a former standout at Canon-McMillan, landed a NCAA provisional-qualifying spot in NCAA Division II Indoor Championships by throwing 55-6¼. He broke his personal record by more than three feet.
The throw has Rideout ranked No. 13 in Division II and No. 1 in the PSAC.
Rideout had a big weekend as one day earlier, at the Crusader Classic hosted by Susquehanna, he won the shot put with a throw of 52-4½.
• Shippensburg senior Nick Gibson of Canonsburg won the 800 meters at the Crusader Classic. Gibson ran 1:55.10, which was a half-second better than his fourth-place time from last year’s PSAC Indoor Championships. Gibson also finished third in the 800 meters at the Gulden Invitational hosted by Bucknell.
N Darius Spinks, a freshman at Defiance, was named Monday the Heartland Collegiate Athletic Conference Track & Field Runner of the Week after setting school records in two events Saturday at the Ohio Northern Invitational.
Spinks, a Washington graduate, posted a time of 6.94 in the 60-meter dash, which stands as the top mark in the HCAC and the seventh-best mark in NCAA Division III this season. Spinks also finished second in the 200-meter dash with a HCAC-best time of 22.72 seconds and was fourth in the long jump (22-0-1/4).
Spinks won the 60 dash, 200 dash and long jump Jan. 30 at the Don and Riley Zimmer Indoor Classic hosted by Trine University in Angola, Ind. Spinks ran 7.08 in the 60, and 22.90 in the 200 and his winning long jump covered 22-6 3/4.
Josh Valentic, a senior guard at Allegheny, was named the North Coast Athletic Conference Player of the Week for Jan. 11-17.
A former standout player at Trinity, Valentic averaged 27 points, 2.5 assists and 2.5 steals during the week, leading Allegheny to wins over Oberlin and Denison.
Against Oberlin, Valentic scored six points in the final 2:30 to spark Allegheny’s 13-3 game-ending run in the Gators’ 62-56 victory. Valentic finished with 27 points, including 20 in the second half, and five steals.
Against Denison, Valentic scored 27 points and led the Gators to a 68-65 victory. Twenty of Valentic’s points came in the first half, when he made nine of 11 shots, including a three-pointer from 30 feet to beat the halftime buzzer.
Valentic is Allegheny’s second-leading scorer, averaging 15 points per game, which ranks ninth in the NCAC. He also leads the conference in minutes played (36.8 per game).
Robert Morris opened its season last weekend by splitting four games at the CSU Dome Tournament hosted by Cleveland State. Olivia Lorusso, a freshman from Eighty Four and a Canon-McMillan graduate, went 5-for-12 with a home run and three RBI for the Colonials. Lorusso went 2-for-2 in a win over Niagara and hit a solo homer in a 3-2 loss to Bowling Green.
Greg Kumer, a junior heavyweight at Waynesburg, was named Monday the Presidents’ Athletic Conference Wrestler of the Week for the second time this season.
A McDonald native and Fort Cherry graduate, Kumer went 5-0 to win his weight class Saturday at the John Summa Memorial Tournament hosted by Baldwin Wallace.
Kumer won his first two bouts with first-period pins and reached the championship with an overtime victory over SUNY Brockport’s Jacob Morris in the semifinals. Kumer concluded the tournament with a 9-5 decision in the title match against the top-seeded Sam Weinger of Rochester Institute of Technology.
For the season, Kumer has a 24-8 record and has won nine consecutive bouts.