CAL POLY ATHLETICS DEPARTMENT PERSONNEL MUSTANG HEAD COACHES
SOFIE AAGAARD Women’s Golf Sixth Year BEAU BALDWIN Football First Year NICK CARLESS Men’s Tennis 10th Year JENNY CONDON Softball 17th Year
MARK CONOVER Director of Track 12th Year Cross Country 23rd Year ALEX CROZIER Women’s Soccer 29th Year LARRY LEE Baseball 19th Year FAITH MIMNAUGH Women’s Basketball 24th Year
TODD ROGERS Beach Volleyball Sixth Year PHIL ROWE Men’s Golf First Year STEVE SAMPSON Men’s Soccer Sixth Year JON SIOREDAS Wrestling Fifth Year
JOHN SMITH Men’s Basketball Second Year CAROLINE WALTERS Women’s Volleyball Second Year
KATHRIN WINTERHALTER Women’s Tennis Sixth Year
PHIL YOSHIDA Men’s and Women’s Swimming and Diving First Year
MUSTANGS EXCEL IN THE CLASSROOM
For more than 100 years, Cal Poly’s student-athletes have been dedicated to excellence in both the athletic and academic arenas. During the 2018-19 scholastic year alone, 118 Mustangs were named to conference all-academic teams. Since Cal Poly transitioned to the Division I level in 1994, the school has enjoyed 1,311 total all-conference academic selections –an average of 52 per year. Taking pride in each student’s ability to excel both athletically and intellectually, Cal Poly and the athletics department offer guidance and support to each student-athlete during his or her tenure. To support these motives, the athletics department initiated the Academic Resource Center. Opened in 2001, the center provides yearround academic support, tutoring, workshops and academic advising. Remodeled in the summer of 2017, the center has also developed study hall programs with biquarterly progress checks, weekly academic appointments and a first-year seminar class for incoming student-athletes. In deference to the student-athlete’s need for class schedule flexibility, Cal Poly also offers in-season priority registration for two of the three quarters during which competition occurs. Of the 66 major courses offered at Cal Poly, Mustang student-athletes were enrolled in 53 separate areas, as of the Fall 2018 term.
ATHLETIC EXCELLENCE
Featuring 21 varsity programs, the Cal Poly Athletics Department is in its 27th year of NCAA Division I competition since completing reclassification in 1994. With the exception of football (Big Sky Conference), wrestling (Pac-12 Conference) and the men’s and women’s swimming and indoor track and field programs (Mountain Pacific Sports Federation), Cal Poly is also in its 25th year as a member of the Big West Conference. Among Big West institutions, only UC Davis (24 programs) boasts more athletic disciplines than Cal Poly. Prior to transitioning to the Division I level, Cal Poly ranked as the most successful institution in the history of NCAA Division II athletics with 35 national team titles. Cal Poly has continued its winning tradition at the top flight with teams and individuals routinely earning conference championships and NCAA Tournament berths. During the 2013-14 academic year, the athletics department -- which added beach volleyball in 2014 -saw the men’s basketball, men’s tennis and baseball programs advance to the NCAA Championships. Individually during the 2018-19 academic year, the men’s and women’s cross country and women’s indoor and beach volleyball teams advanced to the NCAA regionals and captured Big West titles as well. Katie Izzo and Miranda Daschian qualified for the NCAA Championships in cross country and joined Abibat Rahman-Davies and Brooke Tjerrild in track and field’s NCAA West Preliminary Round. Tom Lane qualified in the NCAA Wrestling Championship for the second time. Joe Protheroe and Dominic Frasch (football) along with Crissy Jones and Tia Miric (beach volleyball) earned All-America honors, as did sisters Torrey and Adlee Van Winden (indoor volleyball). Pitcher Bobby Ay (ninth round, Arizona) was selected in the MLB Draft in June 2019. Named Big West athletes of the year were Daschian (women’s cross country), Jake Ritter (men’s cross country), Jones and Miric (beach volleyball) and Torrey Van Winden (indoor volleyball). As testament to Cal Poly’s athletics and academic integrity, 117 Mustangs collected conference all-academic praise during the 2019-20 school year. Cal Poly athletes have consistently excelled outside the bounds of the collegiate arena. Cal Poly was represented at the 2008 Summer Olympics by former Mustangs Sharon Day (United States, high jump), Jimmy Van Ostrand (Canada, baseball) and Stephanie Brown Trafton, whose gold medal for the United States in the discus competition was the first such feat by a Mustang athlete. Day (heptathlon) and Brown Trafton (discus) also qualified for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London while wrestler Boris Novachkov earned a spot in the 2016 Summer Games at Rio de Janeiro.
Other prominent post-Cal Poly examples include AllAmerican wide receiver Ramses Barden (2005-08), who was a third-round selection by the New York Giants in 2009 and played four years in the NFL. Former linebacker Chris Gocong (2002-05) – one of Cal Poly’s three Buck Buchanan Award winners as the Football Championship Subdivision’s top defensive player –made 35 starts in three active seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles. Linebacker Nick Dzubnar currently is with the Tennessee Titans.
Former men’s soccer midfielder Anton Peterlin is the only Big West player to have appeared in an English Football League match. Six former Mustangs -- Junior Burgos (Toronto FC), Patrick McLain (Chivas USA), Kip Colvey (San Jose Earthquakes), George Malki (Houston Dynamo), Ariel Lassiter (L.A. Galaxy) and Justin Dhillon (Seattle Sounders) — have played on Major League Soccer clubs. Mackenzie Pridham plays for Minnesota United FC of the North American Soccer League. Lassiter (Team USA) and Kip Colvey (New Zealand) have been named to national under-23 teams. As of June 2020, the Cal Poly baseball program produced nine Major League players in the last 11 years with outfielder Mitch Haniger (Mariners), pitcher Spencer Howard (Phillies) and infielder Mark Mathias (Brewers) currently on an active roster. Eighteen other Mustangs were active professionally.
