The Dartmouth Sports Weekly 4/11/2016

04.11.16

2015-16 seasons end with heavy coach turnover in the athletic department

EQUESTRIAN HOSTS REGIONALS p. 8

MEN’S TENNIS: SINGLES AND DOUBLES p. 7

THE NUMBERS GAME: SCORING DEFENSE p. 6 SEAMORE ZHU/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

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THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

The Roundup Compiled by James Handal and Evan Morgan

SEAMORE ZHU/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

Men’s lacrosse is still looking for its first Ivy League win after three conference games.

Men’s Lacrosse The men’s lacrosse team fell to No. 1 ranked Yale University 15-5 on Saturday at home. Dartmouth drops to 1-9 overall and 0-3 in Ivy League play while Yale, the only undefeated Division 1 team, improves to 10-0 and 4-0 in Ivy play.

In the first period, Dartmouth matched Yale’s intensity limiting the opportunities for the Bulldogs. Wiley Osborne ’17 scored a tally at 2 minutes 27 seconds left in the period to knot the score at 1-1. The first period ended tied 1-1 with Joe Balaban ’19 recording key saves to keep the Bulldogs from opening the scoring more.

The Bulldogs dominated the second period, outscoring the Big Green 4-1 to lead 5-2. Will Randell ’19 scored a tally late in the second period.

In the third period, the Bulldogs overtook the Big Green and scored nine unanswered goals in the third to lead 14-2. Blair Friedensohn ’16 replaced Balaban in net near the end of the period. The Big Green responded in the fourth period with two goals by Jack Korzelius ’18 and

Osborne’s second of the day to make the score 15-5 after Yale tacked on one more.

Yale outshot Dartmouth 48-27 while netminder Balaban had 12 saves and Friedensohn stopped three.

Women’s Lacrosse Women’s lacrosse dropped a road contest on Saturday versus Cornell University 12-5. The Big Green fall to 5-5 overall and 1-3 in Ivy play, while the Big Red improve to 9-1 and 4-0.

Cornell started the contest very strong with three goals, but the Big Green responded with two tallies.

After exchanging a couple of goals, the Big Red took a 5-3 lead into halftime. Courtney Weisse ’17, Campbell Brewer ’19 and Campbell Probert ’16 all scored for the Big Green in the first half.

The second half was dominated by Cornell who outscored the Big Green 7-2. Cornell outshot Dartmouth 19-7 in the second half and 30-16 overall.

Taryn Deck ’17 led the Big Green with a goal and two assists as Jaclyn Leto ’16, the team’s leading scorer,

Rebecca Asoulin ’17 Editor-in-Chief

04.11.16 VOL. CLXXIII NO. 57

Rachel DeChiara ’17 Publisher

Annie Ma ’17 Executive Editor

Gayne Kalustian ’17 Ray Lu ’18 Sports Editors

Annie Duncan ’17 Kate Herrington ’17 Photography Editors

was not on the score sheet. Charlotte Wahle ’19 recorded seven saves in the loss.

The Big Green will play No. 8 Boston College on Tuesday.

Softball The Dartmouth softball team played the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University this weekend and continued its Ivy League play undefeated winning all four games this weekend. Dartmouth defeated Penn 4-1, 12-1 and Columbia 7-0, 12-2. Dartmouth is 19-9 overall and 8-0 in Ivy League play.

Karen Chaw ’17 and Morgan Martinelli ’19 led Dartmouth against Penn. Chaw hit the game-winning three-run home run in the eighth inning of the first contest to win 4-1.

In the second game, Dartmouth scored 11 runs off of 11 hits in the fourth inning to lead 12-1. Breanna Ethridge ’18 pitched a complete game and improves to 6-3 on the mound.

Kelsey Miller ’16 and Martinelli each recorded three hits with Miller getting five runs batted in.

Morgan McCalmon ’16 led the Big Green on the mound in game one against Columbia and gave up two hits, earning her 11th win.

Maddie Damore ’17 had three hits and four runs batted in to help the Big Green. The Big Green defeated Columbia 7-0. In the second game, Katie McEachern ’16 hit a two-run homer along with a three-run homer to record her ninth overall homer this year. Ethridge allowed just two hits in her time on the mound. In the fourth inning, the Big Green had seven runs off of seven hits. Dartmouth outhit Columbia in the second game 13-4.

Dartmouth plays the University of Massachusetts Lowell tomorrow

MONDAY, APRIL 11, 2016

in its final non-conference series of the year.

Baseball The men’s baseball team played Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania this weekend, which also marked the 150th anniversary of the program, splitting the games versus Penn. Dartmouth beat Penn 2-1 and then fell in game two 11-1. The Big Green beat Columbia 3-1 and 7-6 on Sunday, leaving them at 9-17 and 3-3 in Ivy League play.

Kyle Holbrook ’18 hit a pop-fly to center field allowing Nick Ruppert ’16 to tag in and score the game-winning run, ending the game 2-1. Duncan Robinson ’16 and Penn pitcher Billy Lescher kept the game close, with Robinson allowing seven hits to Lescher’s six.

In game two, the Big Green were out hit and fell 11-1. Penn scored three first inning runs and never looked back as they scored 11 runs and had 14 hits compared to the Big Green’s five.

In the first game against Columbia, Beau Sulser ’16 allowed just one run over six innings to pick up his second win of the season. In the second game, the Big Green rallied with three runs in the ninth inning to pick up the 7-6 victory. Michael Ketchmark ’17 knocked in four runs to lead the team.

Men’s Rowing The No. 11 men’s heavyweight rowing team faced No. 1 Yale University this weekend in Connecticut.

The No. 11 lightweight team took on Princeton University and the University of Delaware in Princeton, New Jersey on Saturday.

Dartmouth placed second behind Yale in all four races. The heavyweight fourth varsity placed seven seconds behind Yale while the third varsity placed four seconds behind Yale’s team. Yale’s second varsity rowing team won by five seconds in 5:49.2 and the Bulldog’s first varsity defeated Dartmouth in 5:46.8.

The lightweight varsity eight placed third behind Princeton and Delaware in 6:20.8. In the second varsity, the Big Green still finished third in 6:42.0. The third varsity also placed third, six seconds behind Delaware.

Women’s Rowing Dartmouth’s rowing team competed at the Class of 1985 Cup hosted by Yale University and with Boston University in Connecticut on Saturday.

In the third varsity eight, the Big Green placed second behind Yale and ahead of the Terriers in 7 minutes and 13.1 seconds. In the varsity eight, Dartmouth placed second again behind Yale who retained the Class of

ANNIE DUNCAN/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

Baseball split with the University of Pennsylvania before sweeping Columbia University.

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

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TIFFANY ZHAI/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

The women’s track and field team took first place at the George Mason University’s Spring Invitational.

1985 Cup. The Big Green placed second in the varsity four behind the Bulldogs.

In the second varsity four, Yale was excluded for missing two turn buoys, so the Big Green captured first ahead of the Bulldogs and Terriers.

Men’s Track and Field The men’s track and field team split up this weekend, with some athletes heading south to Princeton University’s non-scoring Sam Howell Invitational while the remainder of the team competed in the George Mason Invitational. At the latter event, hosted by George Mason University, the Big Green effort was enough for third place.

In the Howell Invitational, Dartmouth runners took to the track in the 3000-meter steeplechase, the 5000-meter and the 10,000, but only Connor Clark ’17 earned a top-10 finish when he ran the 5000, coming in at 10th. Big Green throwers, who had coasted to easy wins at last weekend’s Snowflake Invitational, faced tougher competition this weekend from Princeton and Villanova University athletes. Lucas Ribeiro ’19 finished third in the discus, while Colin Minor ’18 and Tim Brennan ’17 took second and third in the hammer throw.

In Fairfax, Virginia at the George Mason Invitational on Saturday, the men took first in several events en route to a third-place overall performance in the field of 13. Tim Gorman ’16 turned in a time of 3 minutes 52.56 seconds to win the 1500. In the 110-meter hurdles, Parker Johnson ’19 and Alec Eschholz ’19 finished first and third, respectively. The men’s 4x400 relay team ran a 3:24.35, besting its competition by nearly 3 seconds. On the field, Alex Frye ’17 and Ben Ose ’19 were runners-up in

the high jump and pole vault, while Corey Muggler ’17 landed in first place in the long jump for his jump of 6.98 meters.

Women’s Track and Field Like men’s track and field, the Big Green women’s team had athletes in both New Jersey and Virginia this weekend. At Princeton University, Dartmouth women ran and threw against athletes from Ivy foes Harvard University, Yale University, Columbia University and Princeton, in addition to others such as Syracuse University.

In Virginia, the women’s track team won three events outright and beat out 15 other schools to claim first place at the George Mason University’s Spring Invitational.

Helen Schlachtenhaufen ’17 and Reid Watson ’16 had the best finishes of the Big Green runners at Princeton’s Howell Invitational.

Schlachtenhaufen took fifth in the 1500-meter with a time of 4 minutes 34.46 seconds, and Watson’s 16:55.79 in the 5000 netted her third place. Melissa Dunham ’17 had a third-place finish in the discus. Olivia Wiener ’19 took second in the javelin throw.

Dartmouth had a host of secondplace finishes at George Mason.

Runners-up included Sara Kikut ’16 in the 100, Nicole Deblasio ’19 in the 200, Jennifer Meech ’16 in the 400, Grace Thompson ’19 in the 1500, Kaitlin Whitehorn ’16 in the high jump and the 4x400 relay team. Big Green wins came from Meech in the 200 (24.90) and Molly Shapiro ’16 in the triple jump (11.62 meters). The senior 4x100 relay team of Whitehorn, Sara Kikut, Anna Kikut ’16 and Meech also repeated its first-place finish from 2015.

Women’s Tennis No. 52 women’s tennis (10-6, 1-3 Ivy) had another weekend of Ivy matches, this time away from Hanover. They dropped their match to No. 61 Princeton University (11-8, 3-1 Ivy) on Saturday and then again to No. 74 University of Pennsylvania the next day.

With victories from duos Taylor Ng ’17 and Kristina Mathis ’18 as well as Julia Schroeder ’18 and Katherine Yau ’16, the Big Green took the doubles point from Princeton. Yau then won her singles match, putting Dartmouth up 2-0. However, the Tigers stormed back during the remainder of singles play. They won the remaining five matches, including straight-set victories at the No. 3, No. 4 and No. 6

positions, and prevailed 5-2.

The story was similar against Penn.

The Big Green swept the doubles games, but only picked up one win when Jacqueline Crawford ’17 took a straight-set victory at the No. 4 spot.

Men’s Tennis Men’s tennis jumped two spots in the ITA rankings this week, rising to No. 38. The team defended that ranking this weekend at the Boss Tennis Center, earning a 4-2 win over Princeton University on Saturday and a 4-0 win over the University of Pennsylvania on Sunday. The Big Green improved to 15-8 and 3-1 in Ivy League play.

Dartmouth opened the match by taking the doubles point convinc-

ingly. Duos Max Schmidt ’17 and Roko Glasnovic ’19 and Dovydas Sakinis ’16 and Max Fliegner ’18 made short work of their Princeton opponents, winning 6-1 and 6-2. No. 63 pair George Wall ’17 and Brendan Tannenbaum ’16 were up 4-2 on Princeton’s top doubles team when their game was halted. The Tigers struck back with straight-set victories at the No. 2 and No. 6 spots, going up 2-1 on the Big Green. The men closed out the game with victories in the next three singles matches. Schmidt’s 7-6, 6-1 win at the No. 5 position sealed the 4-2 Dartmouth triumph.

The team followed the win over Princeton with a clean 4-0 sweep of the University of Pennsylvania Quakers. Both teams entered the match 2-1 in Ivy play. Dartmouth took five of the first six singles sets and brought home the doubles point.

On Sunday, the team once again quickly defeated their opponent in doubles matches with the third, Fliegner and Sakinis’, being halted.

The team won all three of its singles matches, with the other three being halted as well.

Women’s Rugby Dartmouth women’s rugby traveled to Brown University this past weekend to compete in the NCAA Varsity Sevens tournament. The Big Green fielded two sides — an A-side and a B-side. The A-side finished the tournament 2-2 while the B-side finished 1-1-1.

The A-sides first loss of the day came at the hands of tournament champions, Quinnipiac University.

The Bobcats took home its second consecutive varsity sevens win. The Big Green is set to compete at Westchester University next Saturday in the next leg of the varsity sevens series. Dartmouth is also scheduled to host Bishop’s University at home on Saturday for a fifteens match.

SEAMORE ZHU/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

Men’s tennis finished the weekend by sweeping the University of Pennsylvania 4-0 in Hanover.

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

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MONDAY, APRIL 11, 2016

TRACKING THE

BY THE

5 OF 32 HEAD COACHES ARE GONE FROM HANOVER

NUMBERS

BY ALEXANDER A

13 Total years as head coach for Paul Cormier

5 Years for head coach Erin Lindsey, volleyball

27 Seasons with Nordic ski team for Ruff Patterson

23 Years with swim for head coach Jim Wilson, 10 with the women

18 Years with women’s hockey for Mark Hudak, 13 of which were spent as the head coach

ELIZA MCDONOUGH/THE DARTMOUTH SENIOR STAFF

Women’s hockey head coach Mark Hudak announced that he was retiring from coaching after the 2015-2016 season.

When athletic director Harry Sheehy announced on the morning of March 21 that men’s basketball head coach Paul Cormier would not return for the 2016 season, the news came as somewhat of a surprise. Despite building consistent improvement up until last season and fielding two consecutive freshman classes that contained an Ivy League Rookie of the Year, Cormier now leaves a program to which he devoted 13 total years of his coaching career. Beyond Cormier’s inability to bring the team to a conference win, the decision follows a broader development within Dartmouth athletics — a recent surge, for one reason or another, in turnover among the Big Green head coaching ranks.

In October, it was announced that Jim Wilson would retire as head coach of the men’s and women’s swimming and diving teams at the end of the season. In February, volleyball coach Erin Lindsey left the position, and a few weeks later women’s ice hockey coach Mark Hudak announced his retirement.

The following month brought even more change: Sheehy decided to move in another direction with the basketball program and then just two days later came the announcement that Ruff Patterson — head coach of the men’s Nordic ski team — was resigning.

At the same time, this should hardly imply chaos within Dartmouth sports.

Several programs have enjoyed coaching stability, and even among those that have not, success has remained within those teams’ reach. Moreover, teams continue to thrive and make strides, breaking through historical cold streaks to arrive at newfound prosperity — the football team’s first Ivy League title in 19 years under the trusted tutelage of Buddy Teevens ’79 being the prime example.

Instead, the current juncture represents more of a crossroads, with the

usual combination of promise and uncertainty associated with head coaching vacancies, only multiplied by the unusual number. The athletic department is in a state of flux, but with a sense of direction. The moment attracts greater weight, and accordingly, it’s worth parsing through where each individual program stands and where it goes from here.

The first indication of coaching turnover came before a coach’s season even started.

Nearly a month before the first meet of the 2015-2016 campaign, Wilson announced his retirement in October. This brings his time to an end as a mainstay in Dartmouth athletics while coaching swimming and diving — 10 years for the women’s side and 23 years for the men’s.

“I loved Jim as a coach,” said Christine Kerr ’14, who captained the team her senior year.

“His method of coaching was very old school.

He wasn’t the kind of guy who runs up and down the deck yelling and screaming at you.”

Kerr added that Wilson’s method of coaching works best for swimmers who are very self-motivated. While his style of coaching was very beneficial for her, she acknowledged that it did not work for everyone — especially for some swimmers who need a coach yelling in their face.

“But I loved Jim,” Kerr said. “He was one of the best coaches I ever had, and I’m one of the lucky ones that was able to swim personal-best times every year.”

Both the men’s and women’s teams experienced some of their greater recent success in the 2012-2013 and 2013-2014 seasons, during which both finished in the top five in the Ivy League Championships.

Yet the trajectory since then has fallen decidedly downward under Wilson’s reign. When averaging the Ivy finishes among both men’s and women’s sides, the last few years reveal a consistent decline in conference performance.

As one explanation for this trend, Kerr points to the continual difficulty with recruiting, and simply not matching the number of recruits from Ivy rivals. “[The struggles at the end] were mostly due to not being able to get the recruits that

the other teams in the Ivy League were getting,” she said. “Dartmouth would benefit from getting a big freshman recruiting class, because the upperclassmen feed off the energy of the freshmen. So when you have a lot of freshmen that are hyped, it permeates through the upperclassmen.”

When Kerr, as well as swimmer Charlotte Kamai ’16, discuss the process of finding a new coach, one key common theme arises: coaching adaptability and receptivity to new training methods. Traditional styles of coaching rely on swimming as many yards as possible. Influenced by new research, the style of coaching has changed to focus on less yardage with higher intensity, which has been found to be more effective.

“We are looking for coaches who do a lot of research and are constantly updating their techniques,” Kamai said. “Creativity and ingenuity are two keys for a successful

coach. You don’t want to be doing that same thing year after year. We’re definitely looking for coaches that aren’t stuck in their ways but are open to doing what’s best and are really adaptable.”

A new coach could bring a “rebirth” to the team, Kerr said, bringing a change that could steer the program considerably in the right direction if Wilson’s replacement comes with extensive knowledge on new training methods.

With all of the new coaching transitions, Sheehy made the decision to involve the student-athletes themselves with the search processes, calling the players on these teams very thoughtful about who they want to coach them. Sheehy said it would be hard to imagine a process where he just handed a new coach to a team without its input.

“The process has been narrowed down to a few candidates, they’re coming to campus to do interviews and one part of the interview process is talking to a group of swimmers,” Kamai explained. “It’s really exciting [to be part of the process]. It’s cool to be able to talk to these really accomplished coaches and explain to them why we like Dartmouth swimming and why they should come here.”

Middle blocker and outgoing senior Kaira Lujan ’16 from the volleyball team mentioned the same type of experience, saying that she has met with a range of qualified head coaches and assistants from large and smaller programs.

In her and her team’s case, the task calls for replacing Lindsey. If

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

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COACHING TURNOVER

R FOR GOOD. BUT WHY, AND WHAT ARE WE DOING TO REPLACE THEM?

AGADJANIAN

Ivy Success: Individual Program vs. Average 0 .8 0 .7 0 .6 conference success

successfully done, a new coach will build on the winning ways with which she left the program after her senior season.

“She was really invested in our development, both as athletes and as students,” Lujan said about Lindsey.

“She was very successful at getting the results she wanted. Her technical skill and background prepared us really for matches.”

Out of all of the teams with coaching changes in the last academic year, volleyball was the only one to steadily improve heading into its realignment. After hitting a low over the last six years with a 2-22 record in 2012, the team has enjoyed substantial jumps in Ivy League success in two of the last three years.

That improvement culminated in Lindsey’s best season during her Dartmouth tenure in 2015, when the Ivy League named her Co-Coach of the Year — the first time a Dartmouth coach attained the honor in program history. Most importantly, Dartmouth contended for the conference title for the first time, falling just short of the Ivy League crown after a five-set defeat

by Yale University.

While joining the volleyball staff at the University of Illinois represented a clear movement up in the ranks for Lindsey, Sheehy said the decision was influenced by family considerations.

“She actually would have probably preferred to stay here,” Sheehy said. “[The volleyball team] was two points away from the Ivy championship this year, and she brings almost

0 .5 0 .4 0 .3 0 .2 0 .1 0

2010-11

2011-12

Men's basketball

everybody back. And Illinois is one of the best volleyball programs in the country, so it was an opportunity for her to go to the highest level.”

Lujan offers a very promising future outlook for her former coach’s career, even as Lindsey takes on a position below the head coaching one and enters a more competitive volleyball environment.

“I definitely don’t think she’s even neared her peak as a coach,” Lujan said.

While the key concern heading into the next season is staying on the same track of progress Lindsey paved beforehand, Lujan sees the program Lindsey left at Dartmouth as well-equipped to handle the departure and continue to grow.

“The assistant coaches have been running the show, and I think they’ve kept us in a very good position,” she said. “It was

2012-13

Swimming & Diving

slightly disruptive to hear the news, but we have a very close team and I think that we’re all committed to the end goal of winning an Ivy championship. While it’s a bump in the road, we’ve really handled it quite well.”

In the same month as Lindsey’s departure, Hudak announced not only his retirement from the post as women’s ice hockey coach after 18 years with the program but also likely his permanent exit from the sport. Both aspects of this decision certainly came as a surprise to those close to the team, including captain Laura Stacey ’16.

“I was definitely was very shocked by [his retirement], I wasn’t expecting it at all,” the soon departing senior said. “What we were told is that he doesn’t intend on coaching hockey anymore and that he wants to take a break, and move away and pursue other aspirations, whether that’s hobbies or career paths. I didn’t expect him to move on from hockey, but I definitely support him in what he’s going to move toward next.”

In his 13 years as head coach of the team, Hudak guided the Big Green to two Ivy League titles and amassed the most total wins as a coach in program history. At the same time, the trajectory of the team over the last few years was very distinctive. Dartmouth has plunged from its heights five years ago, performing below program average within the Ivy League in the last three.

Nevertheless, Stacey attests that Hudak leaves a largely positive and impactful mark on the program.

“I think he’s left a really big legacy and footprint on a lot of us here, so he’s definitely going to be missed,” she noted. “Although we weren’t the most successful these last four years, I think he’s always instilled a culture of excellence and I think that’s something the program and Dartmouth generally owes a lot to him. He’s done an amazing job of keeping that culture alive.”

Most recently, Patterson resigned as the head coach of the men’s Nordic ski team, a post he occupied for decades. His 27 years at the helm ties him with three other coaches as

2013-14 Women's hockey

2014-15

2015-16

Volleyball

Average

the longest tenured coach during the 2015-2016 academic year. With 14 skiers earning 31 All-America honors during his time at Dartmouth, Patterson also received the Eastern Intercollegiate Men’s Nordic Coach of the Year award four different times.

“Ruff’s a great, unique individual,” Sheehy said about the former coach.

“With his retirement, there’ll be a big gap to fill there.”

Lindsey’s success is helping her trade up in the sport’s ranks, but for four of the five other teams that consistently play Ivy League opponents, a clear pattern leads up to a coach’s departure.

Men’s basketball, women’s ice hockey and both swimming and diving teams experienced downturns en route to seeing their coaches on the way out. For men’s basketball, it took just one year of decline.

But even the five latest coaching changes don’t speak to the swell of recent restructuring among coaching positions in Dartmouth athletics. Over the last four years, 15 coaching changes have taken place.

The length of coaching tenure at Dartmouth is fairly polarized — teams predominantly have either had a coaching change in the last few years, or have played under the same coach for decades. Seven coaches have been at Dartmouth for at least 24 years.

At the other end of the spectrum, a crowded young crop of coaches aims to break through into tenure security.

In the last year, there were 32 coaching positions at the College. By the end of the 2015-2016 academic year, seven of these positions will only have been occupied by the current coach for one year or less, and 11 for two years or less.

Few coaches fall in the middle ground — those that have stayed at Dartmouth have done so for relative eternities, or on the other hand, have just started. Yet

such a stark split in tenure of coaches was likely not as definite in years past.

Rather, this concentration of younger-tenured coaches represents a more recent phenomenon, and one intentionally ushered in by Sheehy as he has sought to significantly reshape the athletics program since his arrival in the fall of 2010.

“When I got the job [as athletic director] five years ago, it was clear to me we were going to have to make some staffing changes to have better programs,” he said. “Some of those changes we initiated, some of those changes were retirements. The way I look at it, every change is an opportunity for Dartmouth to get better. From a values standpoint, we’ve very much been able to hire to a new vision for the department.”

Balancing what’s best for the studentathletes and pursuit of success forms another essential aspect of managing all these coaching positions and hirings for Sheehy. All the while, Dartmouth’s athletic director sticks fast to a vision and a core of values that he feels will guide all the athletic programs to new levels of success.

“We want a great student-athlete experience, but we also want to win games,” Sheehy said. “[In] tying those two goals together sometimes, there can be some tension and friction, but I don’t think there has to be. Our vision is to be operating at a high level as a department and be values driven — development, resilience, ingenuity, valor and excellence. We want every decision we make to be driven by those five values.”

Speaking about the situation last Thursday, Sheehy said that most of the new hirings will be done in the next couple of weeks.

Next week, Agadjanian will provide in-depth coverage of the men’s basketball program’s dynamics after losing its head coach.

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

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Déjà vu all over again.

In a coincidence sure to have conspiracy theorists everywhere buzzing, opening day of the 2016 season began with a rematch of the 2015 World Series with defending world champion Kansas City Royals hosting the New York Mets. The Major League Baseball schedule, however, was announced last September, before the Royals earned their title on the first of November.

For baseball fans, 2016 started exactly as 2015 ended. To quote the late, great Yogi Berra, “It was like Déjà vu all over again.” It wasn’t just the teams — it was the way the games were played. In the Opening Day showdown on ESPN’s Sunday Night Baseball, the Royals once again showed exactly what they showed in last year’s Fall Classic — the Kansas City lineup is tailor-made to beat the Mets.

The Mets are built around their young pitching staff. Beginning with their Opening Day and World Series Game 1 starter Matt Harvey, the young, tall and hard-throwing players induce hitters to swing and miss more often than any other group in the game. In the National League Championship Series, Harvey and company exposed the free-swinging Chicago Cubs after previously outdueling the Los Angeles Dodgers led by their pair of aces in Clayton Kershaw and current Arizona Diamondback Zack Greinke in the National League Division Series.

However, when the Mets get together with Kansas City, their dynamic pitching staff is unable to achieve their typical swing-and-miss magic.

Thanks to the likes of Eric Hosmer, Mike Moustakas and Alex Gordon, the Royals’ deep and disciplined lineup is able to hold up. They may not square up every Met offering, but they make life miserable for the Amazins.

On the very first pitch a Met threw in the World Series — a fastball from Harvey in the bottom of the first inning of Game 1 in Kansas City — Royals’ shortstop Alcides Escobar sent a long fly ball to left center, a fly ball Mets’ centerfielder Yoenis Cespedes probably should have caught. Instead, the ball short-hopped the fence and caromed away from Cespedes. In the meantime, Escobar raced around the bases for a rare, stand-up inside-thepark home run. One pitch, 1-0 Royals.

In the bottom of the first of Opening Night, Harvey retired Escobar, then got Moustakas to send a fly ball towards Cespedes, this time playing left. Cespedes definitely should have caught this one. Instead, Moustakas was able to reach first as the ball went in and out of Cespedes’s glove. After a passed ball and walk for Lorenzo Cain, Hosmer singled home Moustakas — 1-0 Royals.

The particulars were different — at least a little bit — but the end results were the same. The Royals’ lineup didn’t take long to show their superiority over the Mets’ staff. One game into the 2016 season, things didn’t seem all too different for the combatants in last year’s Series.

In 2015, there was one exception to the Mets’ struggles with the Royals, and that exception came in the form of a 6-foot-6, 240-pound Texan with the name and hair of a Norse god.

Noah Syndergaard, then a 23-yearold rookie was handed the ball to start Game 3, the series’ first game in the Big Apple with the Mets already down two games to none.

Given the circumstances, it would have been easy for the rookie to succumb to the pressure of the moment.

Instead, on the game’s first pitch, he sent a 99 mile-per-hour fastball just above the head of Escobar, who again was leading off for the Royals. He followed it up with a pair of curveballs for strikes and blew another 99 mile-perhour heater past Escobar to complete a four-pitch strikeout. By game’s end, Syndergaard pitched six innings, giving up three runs and earning the Mets’ only win of the series.

In the postgame press conference, Syndergaard was asked about his first pitch, a clear and deliberate attempt to send a message to Escobar and the rest of the Royals.

“If they have a problem with me throwing inside, they can meet me 60 feet and 6 inches away,” Syndergaard said.

In the final game of the Royals’ and Mets’ two-game set to open the season, Syndergaard took the mound. Once again, unlike Harvey, Syndergaard tamed the Royals’ powerful bats. He went six innings, struck out nine and allowed just three hits without giving up a run. The Mets would go on to win 2-0.

So, the defending champs took the first game of the series, showing they still how to get to the game’s scariest pitching staff. Syndergaard proved that, unlike his teammates, he could handle the Royals’ formidable lineup.

It’s far too early to tell if either team has what it takes to get back to baseball’s biggest stage. Certainly, these two teams look like a pair that could go all the way. The Royals’ lineup has the depth to deal with any pitcher in the game. The Mets’ staff can deal with any batting order in the game, with one glaring exception — Syndergaard.

If these teams do collide again come October, bet on the Royals, unless the Mets can figure out how to get their Norseman on the hill every game.

Each week The Numbers Game will break-down one Dartmouth sport’s statistic.

This week’s #: 10.1, Dartmouth football’s scoring defense It’s an old adage in football that defense wins championships. In the 2015-2016 season for the Dartmouth football team, which captured the Big Green’s first Ivy League title since 1996, this tired expression once again rang true. Although the team featured a robust offense that was able to dominate opposing defenses through the air and on the ground, this iteration of Big Green football really hung its hat on the defensive side of the ball. Led by a talented defensive-line that featured A.J. Zuttah ’16, the Big Green were also fortunate to possess a ball-hawking secondary starring David Caldwell ’16 and Will McNamara ’16 that was able

MONDAY, APRIL 11, 2016

to take advantage of the pressure that the front four applied to opposing quarterbacks on a week in, week out basis.

The Big Green led the Ivy League in total defense by allowing a stingy 277.7 yards per game. More importantly, the Big Green led the entire Ivy League in scoring defense — giving up 10.1 points per game on the year.

The scoring defense is simply calculated by dividing the total number of points a team gave up on the year by the number of games played. For the 2015-2016 season, the Big Green allowed 101 points in their 10 Ivy contests to give them an extraordinary 10.1 points per game overall scoring defense. This impressive number led the Ivy League by almost a field goal.

Harvard University was second in the Ivy League with a defense that gave up 13.0 points per game, while Columbia University finished the season in third by giving up 19.8 points per game.

The other five Ivy League defenses all gave up on average over 20 points per contest, illustrating the Big Green’s utter dominance on this side of the ball last season.

The Big Green’s defense, from a points perspective, was also impressive in terms of teams outside of the Ancient Eight. Out of the 125 teams that competed in the Football Championship Subdivision in the 2015 season, the Dartmouth football team boasted the best scoring defense in the entire conference. Take a look at FCS powerhouse North Dakota State University, who won their fifth consecutive FCS title last

season, for comparison. They gave up 15.3 points per game on the season.

If we look at the National Football League, the 1985 Chicago Bears are widely considered one of the most dominant defenses in league history.

Led by innovative defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan, the ’85 Bears’ defense developed the revolutionary 46 defense that thrived behind a marquee aggressiveness at all three levels of their scheme. Boasting future hall of famers Mike Singletary and Richard Dent as well as stars Wilber Marshall and Otis Wilson, the ’85 Bears led the league in almost every defensive statistical category including total yards allowed, total points allowed and turnovers.

Additionally, those Bears allowed 12.4 points per game on the season. Even the much heralded ’85 Bears defense gave up more points per game than the Big Green did last season. The argument is not that this Dartmouth defense was more dominant than their ’85 Bears’ counterpart, but rather the comparison helps to further exemplify what a special season the Big Green had from a defensive standpoint last season.

Head coach Buddy Teevens ’79, who is entering his 16th season as the head coach of the Dartmouth football program, will need his defense to play a big role next year as well if the Big Green hopes to repeat as Ivy League champions. That said, replicating the historical dominance of this year’s defense will certainly be a major challenge for the entire coaching staff and roster.

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

MONDAY, APRIL 11, 2016

SW 7

Breaking down men’s tennis’ doubles and singles records

By MARK CUI

The Dartmouth Staff

The Dartmouth men’s tennis team’s 2015-16 season has been rock solid, with the team currently sporting an impressive 15-8 record. The team has scored highlight wins over many quality opponents, including then No. 37 Drake University and then No. 32 Tulane University.

The team has successfully found a balance between both its singles and doubles play, going 146-78 to win 65.1 percent of singles matches and 65-31 to win 67.7 percent of doubles matches. However, these statistics are unreflective of the season, as this includes statistics from tournaments but does not reflect streaks.

While the team dominated singles in January, going 26-9, the team has cooled down considerably since then, recording a record of 5134. On the other hand, the doubles teams have gone in the opposite trend. While the doubles teams went 11-7 overall in matches but only 3-3

in doubles points secured in January, the team since then has gone 30-14 overall with an outstanding 12-5 in doubles points secured. While the win-loss record has remained relatively consistent throughout the season, the high percentage of doubles points won is highly impressive. To win the doubles point, the team needs to win two of three of the doubles matches, each of which is only one set.

Played before the singles, a victory in the best out of three doubles matches can give the team a significant morale boost. One reason for the solid doubles performance since the end of January is the solidification of the lineup.

“We’ve moved it twice, so we’re kind of in our third variation of our doubles team,” head coach Chris Drake said. “We’re trying to look for people who complement each other in their games and their personalities on the court. That’s something that’s very important as you try to play as one team and one unit out there.”

George Wall ’17 echoed a similar sentiment. The last four matches have been especially encouraging for the doubles team.

“We’re always trying to find our best doubles combinations and lineup, and I think we’re really starting to get it right,” Wall said.

“We’ve won our last four doubles points now against strong teams and that’s been from good pairings and executing fundamentals which make you successful in doubles.”

While the doubles point is important, it only counts for one out of the seven possible points. The six singles matches count for the other six. One of the main reasons for the weaker singles record is a tougher schedule and the increase of away opponents. While double matches consist of only one set, single games are best out of three. Thus, the away atmosphere can have a much larger impact on the outcome, giving opponents who train on those courts every day a much greater advantage.

This can be seen especially during the month of February, in which

the team’s singles failed to surpass a 3-3 record for its first three games.

Overall, the team has gone 10-1 in home games and 5-7 in away games.

“We hit the road a bit in February and March,” Wall said. “[It’s] never easy to win at opposition venues where the opponent trains day in, day out. But we get better for that exposure to unfamiliar conditions where the court speeds are different and the home fans are scrappy.

We’re benefitting from that travel now in Ivy season.”

To win the match, the team needs four points, one of which could be the doubles point. With mostly upperclassmen in the singles lineup, the team has done extremely well in high-pressure situations this year.

The team has won exactly three singles points in four of the last nine games, which along with a doubles victory, is just enough to secure the overall match victory.

It’s important to note that despite the trends, the singles players have also helped win several matches despite the doubles loss. One of the

goals for the team going forward is to play a more complete game in both singles and doubles.

“Our singles carried us to a couple of big wins over Tulane and Drake,” Drake said. “The doubles and singles have been a bit back and forth. We’ve been streaky. Hopefully at the end, what we really want to do is to play a complete match, compete well in doubles and have a complete match in singles as well.”

Wall, who plays both singles and doubles, noted that there is a fundamental difference in approach to the two. However, he stressed that both were equally important and fundamental to the team’s success.

“Doubles is just one set. It flies by,” Wall said. “You have to be ready to go right away and play aggressive tennis from the get-go. In singles, there’s more of an opportunity to work your way into the match and figure your opponent out....We value every court, and the approach doesn’t change from doubles to singles. We want to be competitive and combative at every spot.”

the sport at all to being able to play at the varsity level. In the transition from a club team to a varsity team, many of the players had never played rugby before walking on. Zepeda said it takes time to adopt the mentality of being a varsity athlete.

The expanded playing time has also improved the coaching staff’s focus on other players on the team, not just the ones who travel.

“Last season, when we were still a club team, and our coach then coached the A-side and then the assistant coach coached the B-side, I sometimes felt like we had no attention from the head coach,” Zepeda said. “This season, our coach has been really good about [focusing on different players] and at no point do you feel like there are some who aren’t focused on.”

Benefits aside, the switch to playing both sevens and fifteens has its difficulties. For one, the playing styles in sevens and fifteens are slightly different. The two require different mindsets, co-captain Kerry Conlin ’16 said, and strategies change as the team has different offensive and defensive priorities. With fewer players on the field and less time on the clock in sevens, Conlin explained that play has to be more fluid while possession time becomes more important. In contrast, fifteens play requires more intricacy and set pieces remain more influential.

So far in the spring season, the team has only played sevens. They have largely resorted to fielding a team of more experienced athletes, a decision largely made by focusing on what best meets the players’ needs.

“It depends on where our focus is as a team and with positional development, so sometimes it might be more useful for a player to stay back,” Dowty said.

However, the vast differences between the two games can make effectively switching between the two difficult. On tour in California, the team played only fifteens. As soon as they got back to Hanover, players had to switch immediately into the mindset of sevens.

“Having that mental shift and strategy is tough,” Zepeda said. “So we struggled in the beginning, but now that we’re back in it.”

Indeed, dividing the team ostensibly into two separate teams could also lead to a split in the overall group.

The team was aware that the coaching staff would be experimenting with this new model this season.

“It’s definitely one of our biggest challenges.” Zepeda said. “It can divide the team. But we’re very vocal about it, and we communicate about it.”

Playing two different sets of games forces the team to sometimes split on the weekends, when one or both groups will be traveling to tournaments. Despite the different schedules, the teams stay in touch.

On a whole, the athletes think that this change has been beneficial.

“I think everyone understands that planning our season like this ultimately benefits everyone, because players get more minutes, and there is more room for people to step into leadership roles,” Conlin said. “So far I have been very impressed with the team’s attitude — we all look out for

Women’s rugby is relying on team unity to carry it through a split season.

Women’s rugby plays split spring season, seeks future growth

By CHRIS SHIM

The Dartmouth Staff

In the past year, the Dartmouth women’s rugby program has been host to many changes. Not only is it now a fully recognized varsity sport, but it is also one of the few programs in NCAA women’s rugby to be fielding teams of both sevens and the more traditional fifteens.

“We’re one of the only teams [that does this],” Ashley Zepeda ’18 said. “But at the same time, it’s useful because we’re trying to develop the team.”

Indeed, playing both sevens and fifteens allows many more players to get game time. The fall season is traditionally reserved for fifteens, when 15 players take the field at one time with eight substitutes. The spring season features more games of sevens, when the team sends 12 with seven starting on the field in shorter games.

“Playing sevens puts your individual skills under the microscope, since there are fewer players,” head coach Katie Dowty said. “Everyone needs to be able to catch a pass, and there’s nowhere to hide. It allows for development for fifteens as well.”

On a team of 34, many of the athletes do not get a chance to take the field all season, especially in the spring. With both seasons, Dowty said that the overall increased playing time has been a huge benefit to the team, something that would not be possible with just sevens.

By giving more athletes the chance to play, this system has proved essential towards developing walk-on players to get them from not knowing

COURTESY OF GAYNE KALUSTIAN

each other, and that hasn’t changed.”

Being able to manage the two squads has not been difficult for the coaching staff. Conlin said that the staff is split between the fifteens and the sevens, and the training staff remains available for both competitions. At practices, all the players will work out and do general drills together before splitting up by position.

Playing both sevens and fifteens can sometimes strain the roster when injuries arise. Despite the injuries, the team has benefitted from versatility.

With two injured players last week, freshmen stepped in to fill the gap.

Zepeda said that the team played just as well, adding the group was adjusting well and remained resilient.

It is this versatility that has made

the team successful thus far in making this unique system work. How this affects the program’s future, however, remains to be seen.

“I think it’ll show next fall,” Zepeda said. “All of these other teams will get really good at sevens, but we’ll have a whole season where we worked on fifteens, and it’ll make our roster have a lot more depth in the fall.”

Like Zepeda, Dowty is also eyeing the future advantages.

“The whole point is that we see a big competitive advantage in building depth and fielding a whole second side,” Dowty said. “It’s a very obvious trend that the most successful programs have two or three squads that are always playing and developing.”

THE DARTMOUTH SPORTS WEEKLY

SW 8

SPORTS

MONDAY, APRIL 11, 2016

TUESDAY MONDAY LINEUP LINEUP

MEN’S LACROSSE No athletic AT VERMONT events 3 PM scheduled

Equestrian hosts Regionals, ultimately send two to Nationals

COURTESY OF DAVID CORDERO

The equestrian team benefitted from riding familiar horses at Regionals.

By EVAN MORGAN The Dartmouth Staff

Before his sophomore summer, David Cordero ’16 could count on one hand the number of times he had ridden a horse. On Sunday, he represented Dartmouth’s equestrian team at Zones, one step below the national stage.

Cordero is one of a record 12 Big Green riders who competed at the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association Zone 1, Region 2 Championship on April 2 at Dartmouth’s Morton Farm. Five of those riders went on to represent the Big Green at Zones this past weekend by placing first or second in their class at Regionals. In IHSA competition, riders compete at eight divisions: Walk Trot, Walk Trot Canter, Novice Flat, Novice Fences, Intermediate Flat, Intermediate Fences, Open Flat and Open Fences. Riders earn points for their performances at shows throughout their collegiate career. Once a rider accumulates enough points in one class — 28 for open, the highest level, and 36 for the other classes — that rider qualifies to compete at Regionals.

In the April 3 Regionals show,

Dartmouth’s equestrians rode against the best competition they faced in the regular season. To make things even more difficult, judges had free rein to challenge the riders by asking them to do difficult tests.

The tests, tailored to riders’ skill levels, range from knowledge and horsemanship questions to particular demonstrations of skill.

“If the judge has difficulty deciding between riders or if she wants to challenge them a bit more, she will bring them back into the ring and ask for a shortened course,” Olivia Champ ’19 said. “We’re not allowed to talk to the coach, so it’s all about the rider having to decode what the judge wants us to do and it’s always very technical.”

Much of the equestrian team’s spring break was spent preparing for challenges like those they would encounter at Regionals and Zones.

The team fled frigid Dartmouth for Ocala, Florida, traveling to a renowned thoroughbred center where the riders trained at Kimberden Farm under trainer Kim Burnette.

“It was really awesome to get away from Hanover winter, go to Florida and ride really nice horses in the sunshine and get to hear another instructor,”

Cordero said.

In collegiate competition, riders are randomly assigned to a horse at each show. Over break, the team spent their time in Florida learning how to assess and adjust their styles to the different kinds of horses they could be assigned to ride in a meet.

Upon returning to Hanover, the team had a clinic with C.J. Law, the head coach from three-time IHSA national champion Mount Holyoke College and worked out with the horses every day to make up for the riders’ absence.

Familiarity with the horses gave Dartmouth a home field advantage of sorts at Regionals. Many of the horses used in the competition were Dartmouth’s own, so Big Green riders were acquainted with their quirks and dispositions.

Those dispositions can make some horses easier to ride than others. Certain riders look for particular traits.

“I tend to like a horse that goes more forward,” Catherine Conway ’17 said. “I don’t really like to have to inspire the horse and drive it forward the entire time. I would rather have a more forward horse and balance it and bring it back.”

Champ prefers something slightly different.

“Something I look for is that they’re happy to be doing their job, and that they’re willing and they want to listen and they want to try,” Champ said of her mounts. “Regardless of whether

they’re super bouncy or a little bit stiff to one side, if they are willing to work with me, and they’re excited to be doing what they are doing, it makes it that much better.”

Lindsay Seewald ’16 advanced to Zones in two classes by placing second in the Intermediate Flat class and winning the Intermediate Fences.

Seewald survived a difficult ride-off to win her large Intermediate Fences class at Regionals. She also competed in the Intermediate Flat, where she pulled a relatively new horse that she had been working with frequently during practices, a lucky pairing that Champ thought helped Seewald stand out.

Champ competed in both Open Fences and Open Flat against the University of Vermont’s Alex Carlton, the only other rider to qualify in the two classes. Champ was also recognized as the region’s Cacchione Cup Reserve Champion for accumulating the second-most points throughout the season.

“I’m always impressed with Olivia’s riding,” Cordero said of Champ’s performance. “She just rides horses so well and so confidently but also without it being in your face.”

Champ finished second in the Open Flat and won the Open Fences at Regionals.

Conway, who placed second in Novice Fences, and Cristiana Salvatori ’17, with a second-place ribbon in Walk Trot Canter, also moved on to Zones.

Cordero, competing in Walk Trot, was the last rider of the day. Despite picking up riding midway through college, he says his time in the saddle gave him the edge over his competitors at Regionals.

“I feel at this point I am more experienced to the point where I can work on more detailed things instead of the bare basics,” he said. “The things that I’m working on are small things, like making sure that my wrists are not too bent, or making sure that my elbows are close enough to my body, or making sure my shoulders are back.”

The judges concurred, awarding Cordero a blue ribbon for first place along with the opportunity to compete at Zones.

“It was a cool moment for myself to see all the hard work that I’ve been putting in over the past two years learning to ride at Dartmouth, working with horses, learning about horses, and be like, ‘Yeah, you won your region — awesome,’” Cordero said.

At the Zone 1 Championship — held Saturday at Mount Holyoke College — 10 riders in each class sought to finish in the top two, earning a trip to Kentucky in May for Nationals. For three of the Big Green equestrians, the journey ended at Zones. Salvatori placed seventh, Champ took fifth in the Fences and third in the Flat, and Cordero finished fifth. Seewald and Conway both finished as Reserve Champions and will ride individually at the IHSA National Championships.

COURTESY OF DAVID CORDERO

Twelve riders qualified for Regionals, five of whom then went to Zones and two of whom are headed to Nationals.