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Making Their Marks in Athletics

from Blueprint Magazine | Summer 2023

from Blueprint Magazine | Summer 2023, page 46

Class Notes

Former Vanderbilt basketball star and longtime Tennessee State coach and athletic director TERESA LAWRENCE PHILLIPS ’76 was named to the Tennessee Sports Hall of Fame's Class of 2023. Phillips has now been added to five halls of fame in the last seven years: Vanderbilt Athletics in 2017, Greater Chattanooga and Girls Preparatory School in 2018, and the Ohio Valley Conference in 2021.

12 ANNAMIEKE MCREYNOLDS BLACKMAN

’96 broke a world record in the 200M breaststroke for her division in Masters Swimming at the 2023 SE BSL Jack Barnacastle Invitational. She is part of the Lifetime Swim Team and completed the race with a time of 2:43.20. Blackman was inducted into the Southeastern Swimming Hall of Fame in 2008 and the GPS Athletic Hall of Fame in 2011.

SHELBY WALTERS ’19 transferred from Duke to Georgia to finish out her college softball career as a graduate student. She made the 2023 NFCA Third Team All-Southeast Region, 2023 First Team All-SEC, and 2023 SEC Softball Community Service Team, and was twice named SEC Pitcher of the Week.

13 LARKIN BROWN ’19 was part of the ACC Champion rowing team at the University of Virginia this spring and was also named Teammate of the Year by her fellow rowers in Charlottesville.

14 LANE LAWRENCE ’19, a senior soccer player at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, received the Ruel Fox Burns Blanket during the 2023 Athletic Honors and Awards Presentation. According to the university, the Ruel Fox Burns Blanket is presented to the department’s top senior male and female athletes as voted by the coaching staff. During her career at Rose-Hulman, Lawrence amassed 24 goals, 23 assists, and 71 points, ranking her as number five in school history in all three categories for teams that won the HCAC and reached NCAA Tournaments in 2019 and 2022.

15 REAGAN LONG ’19 was named All-Big 12 First Team in rowing after powering the University of Tennessee to its best finish in program history at the conference championship regatta in Austin, Texas.

Softball standout ELIZABETH WARWICK ’20 was named 1st Team All-MVC and All-Defensive Team after a sensational junior season for Southern Illinois University.

16 CHAPEL CUNNINGHAM '21 was named 1st Team All-Sun Conference in softball after a sophomore season at Southeastern, where she ranked first in the conference in stolen bases with 32. Cunningham posted a team-high .413 batting average against conference opponents, helping her team to 31 regular season wins. She also made national news during a home game against Grand View University (Iowa) when opponent Kaitlyn Moses hit a grand-slam home run to give Grand View a 5-4 lead. Moses sustained an injury rounding first base and hit the ground, and per the rules, none of her teammates could assist her, so Cunningham and her teammate Leah Conzalez picked her up and carried her from base to base until she crossed home plate.

ANSLEY BLEVINS ’22 finished her first softball season at Middle Tennessee State University with impressive stats: second on the team in homers with six and first on the team in fielding with a .987 record. Blevins and her teammates proceeded to win a program-record 42 games, including the conference tournament, becoming the first C-USA team since Tulane in 2014 to win three games in an NCAA regional. Blevins followed her C-USA all-tournament team selection by making the allregional team in Tuscaloosa, where she hit a home run against Alabama.

17 MADDIE GRACE HUBBARD '22 was named Collegiate Conference of the South Rookie Player of the Year for softball after hitting .461 and driving in 23 runs for Huntingdon College this spring.

ELLIE TALIAFERRO ’22 amassed some impressive results in the pool during her freshman year at Vanderbilt, including posting the Commodores’ top times in the 200 free and 200 IM, meeting the NIC B Standard in both events.

18 From the GPS Tennis Team of 1984, friends and teammates SHOLAR CLARK HOWARD ’85, MELANIE MERCER REYNOLDS ’84, and CELESTE CENTER ’86 reunited in Chattanooga at Gallery 1401 for Celeste’s brother Austin Center’s art opening on March 23.