Weekly Preview Feb. 4, 2010
Swimmers off to AUS championship
This weekend the Sea~Hawks swimming, women’s volleyball, and
women’s basketball teams will be in action on the road. The
swimmers are heading to Charlottetown with high hopes for the AUS
Championship. The women’s volleyball team is off to
Antigonish to take on St. FX in a weekend series. The women’s
basketball team will be in action in Wolfville, looking to rebound
in a weekend series against the Axewomen.
Swimming
The Sea~Hawks swim team will head to UPEI this weekend for the
Atlantic Univesity Sport Championship in Charlottetown. With a
number of athletes already qualified for CIS Champs, a large amount
close to qualifying times in their events, and a great facility
from last summer’s Canada Games for competition Memorial has
high hopes of having a record breaking weekend.
Both men's and women's swim teams will put a big push to get more
swimmers qualified for the CIS Championships at the University of
Toronto Febraury 18-20th. The men's team will already be
represented at CIS by sophomore David Forbes who qualified in the
50m and 100m Freestyle and the 50m Butterfly, as well as 5th year
Timothy Rusted who qualified in the 1500m Freestyle. The women's
team will be represented by sophomore Kelsie Rogers for her 50m
Freestyle and Leah Tomblin who qualified two weeks ago in the 200m
backstroke.
This weekend at the AUS Championships the men’s and
women’s will aim to repeat second place team finishes from
last year, when they finished only behind Dalhousie. UNB will be
the strongest competition for the Sea-Hawks for second place in
both the men's and women's competition.
The Sea~Hawks men's team will be led by David Forbes who will be
racing for Gold in all four of his 50m and 100m Freestyle and
Butterfly events. 5th year Timothy Rusted will be competing in his
last AUS Championships and looks to add to his career medal total
in the distance freestyle events. Rookies Adam Harvey (freestyle
and backstroke), Richard Hibbs (breaststroke and individual medley)
and Ryan Allen (breaststroke, butterfly) will all aim to medal and
qualify for CIS Championships during the meet. Tim Bennett
(backstroke) and Brett Foster (butterfly) will also be focused on
finaling in their events to push the team to their second place
goal. Both should close in on CIS qualifying standards.
The Sea~Hawks women's team have high expectations for the five
swimmers travelling this weekend. Leah Tomblin will be in position
to medal in all of the backstroke events. Kelsie Rogers will be
racing for medals in the sprint freestyle and butterfly events.
Dayna Hogan (distance freestyle) and Erin Daly (breaststroke) will
be aiming to qualify for CIS Championships as well as medal in
their top events. Third year Monica MacGillivray is the veteran of
the young team and will be competing in the individual medley and
freestyle events.
The CIS Championships will be Feb 18-20th, check up on the
Sea~Hawks Sportsline for updates throughout the weekend at
737-7678.
Women’s Volleyball
The Sea~Hawks take to the road this weekend to Antigonish, Nova
Scotia to take on a surging St. Francis Xavier squad in a two game
series. St. FX, now 7-7, are 6-1 in 2010 as they have found their
niche as a team behind the strong play of Katherine Ryan.
Last season’s AUS Rookie of the Year and CIS All Rookie Team
member has been sensational for the X-Women this year, currently
ranked fifth in the AUS in kills/game at 2.83. Another second year
left side playing exceptionally for St. FX is Catherine Thornton,
averaging 14.0 points and 12.3 digs in the team’s past three
wins. St. FX will look to this young nucleus of attack hitters to
play aggressively from the opening serve this weekend.
The Sea~Hawks continued to face adversity this past weekend as they
were unable to seal the win being up two sets to one against UNB
and losing the second match in straight sets. Despite the two
losses, Memorial will look to build off some of the positives shown
in these two games. Second year left side Erin Bursey was fantastic
for the ‘Hawks this past weekend, averaging 10.8 points and
13.0 digs against the Reds. Sasha Wilkins missed the second match
of the weekend due to injury, her status is questionable for this
week’s action. Veterans Nicole Jolliffe and Sarah Strickland
both put forth solid efforts in last weekend’s matches and
look to continue leading the team as they head to St. Francis
Xavier. Matches begin at 6:00 p.m. on Saturday and finish up 11a.m.
Sunday (AST).
Never count this young team out as they have shown that, despite
their record, they will compete from start to finish.
Women’s Basketball
After a rough pair of game this past weekend at the hands of the
Capers the Sea~Hawks look to get back to their winning ways as they
travel to Acadia. After dropping both contests to CBU, Memorial
drops to 9-5 and now sits third in the AUS behind St. Francis
Xavier and first place Cape Breton. The ‘Hawks swept the
Axewomen at the Field House in November but both games were
close.
Despite the disappointing 3-10 record, the Acadia Axewomen have
been playing better basketball than one would think. They have only
lost by an average margin of 3.0 points in the past five games
which included formidable opponents like CBU, Dalhousie, and St.
Francis Xavier. Although they have lost eight in a row, Acadia has
more fight in them and need to be prepared for accordingly if the
Sea~Hawks want to secure a win.
A point of emphasis for the ‘Hawks this weekend will be to
shut down former AUS All-Star Alise Brown who is currently 3rd in
the AUS in both scoring and assists at 19.4 ppg and 3.69 apg,
respectively. Acadia has plenty of fire power but their
difficulties lie in being able to stop runs and be effective
defensively, as a team they allow the second most points per game
in the AUS.
Although the ‘Hawks are coming off a very difficult weekend
they have sown that they are a resilient bunch. This trend should
continue as the women head into Wolfville. Look for the backcourt
of Brittany Dalton and Erin Mullaley to bounce back and play
inspired, aggressive basketball while the veteran front line of
Ally Forsey, Grace Fishbein and Vicki Thistle continue to outmuscle
their opponents at the hoop.
Games begin on Saturday with tip off at 7 p.m. and finish up Sunday
afternoon at 2 p.m. (AST)