SMSU Athletics

December 16, 2010 – Hoof Prints Article
 
Hello Mustang Fans!

Today marks the last day of finals on the campus of SMSU. The students will be heading home to spend time with their families over the Winter Break. SMSU campus life will quiet down until Monday, January 10 when classes start up for the spring semester and the Mustangs will have eight sports in full swing. Wrestling, Women’s Basketball, Men’s Basketball and Wheelchair Basketball completing the final leg of their Winter Seasons, while Softball, Tennis, Baseball and Women’s Golf all begin preparing for their Spring Seasons. Scheduling of facilities gets a little crazy in the months of January, February and March.

As many of you may remember last spring, the NCAA put forth legislation, the “Life in Balance” package, that reduced contests and practice hours for specific sports, pushed back the start dates of the fall sport’s seasons and also implemented a dead period for winter sports teams over the December Winter Break.
The Mustang Women’s Basketball, Men’s Basketball, Wheelchair Basketball and Wrestling are not allowed to practice or compete this year from December 20-26 as part of the Winter Break Dead Period.

At this year’s NCAA Convention, Division II Leadership will put forth Phase II of the “Life in Balance” legislation that the membership will vote on during the business session on January 15, 2011. This package contains legislation that will address team, individual and weight lifting and conditioning workouts in the off-season for specific sports providing the student-athletes four days of no activity at the beginning of the fall semester for off-season sports. There is legislation that will change the parameters of the Winter Break Dead Period and address practice and competition start dates for winter and spring sports. It will be another intense NCAA Convention this year with many pieces of legislation that are aimed at bringing the lives of our student-athletes back in balance.  

The SMSU Wrestling team had 10 wrestlers place at the Buena Vista Open last weekend in Storm Lake, IA. Zach Coates and Trent Molacek led the Mustangs going 3-0 on the day as the champion at 174 pounds. Molacek followed that performance going 4-0 at 165 pounds and winning that weight class.

Nine Mustangs wrestlers placed sixth or higher at the Buena Vista Open. Travis Borchert finished second place at 125 pounds and Justin Reinsma picked up second place honors at 133 pounds. Brian Beilke also came in fourth at 133 pounds for SMSU as well. Ethan Hildebrandt lost his second bout of the night before reeling off four straight wins to take third place at 141 pounds.

Casey Field finished the day 2-1 at 157 pounds while finishing in second place. Billy Fate went 3-1 and finished third at 174 pounds. Brian Rodas and Andrew Rodas made their first appearances of the season after spending the fall with the SMSU football team. Andrew Rodas picked up a second place finish at 197 pounds while Brian went 1-2 and finished sixth at 285 pounds.

Coates started the afternoon off with a win by fall at 2:56 over Ryan Peres and followed that with a win by fall at 1:13 over Casey Paprocki of Buena Vista.

The Mustangs will pick up action on January 19 when they head to Mitchell, SD to take on Dakota Wesleyan and Northwestern (Iowa) in a triangular starting at 4:30 pm.

The Mustang Men’s Basketball team (5-3, 2-2 NSIC) will be on the road for the second straight weekend completing a four-game NSIC road trip. The Mustangs first head to Winona State (6-1, 2-1 NSIC) on Friday, before traveling to Fayette, IA on Saturday to meet Upper Iowa (2-5, 1-2 NSIC). Both games are set for an 8:00 pm tip-off. SMSU is coming off two heartbreaking losses by one point last weekend to SCSU and Concordia.
 
The SMSU Women’s Basketball team (2-6, 1-3 NSIC) will also be on the road for the final stretch of a four game road trip ending this weekend. The Mustangs will begin the two game set at Winona State (6-1, 2-1 NSIC) on Friday, at McCown Gymnasium. The Mustangs will then travel to Fayette, IA on Saturday to take on Upper Iowa (0-7, 0-3 NSIC). Both games are set to tip-off at 6:00 pm. The SMSU Women’s Basketball team also lost two games last weekend with last Friday’s loss coming on a last second shot by SCSU.

The Mustang Wheelchair Basketball team (6-1 overall) will return to action January 15-16 as the Mustangs play host to the Timberwolves with the set at 4:00 pm and 6:00 pm on January 15 and 10:30 am on January 16. The following weekend (Jan. 21-23), the Mustangs will head to Champagne, IL for the College Conference Wheelchair Basketball Tournament

Good luck to all of our Mustang Teams this week. Go Mustangs!

Congratulations to Rick Haberman of Tracy, MN, who provided the correct answer to last week’s Mustang Hoofprints Trivia Question: How many SMSU Wheelchair Basketball players have scorer 1,000 or more in their career? The Mustangs have had twelve players who have reached the 1,000 career point mark at SMSU with Nathan Carruth becoming number twelve during the 2009-10 season.

Hoofprints Trivia Question (please put this in a box with the title on top)

The 2011 Mustang Gold Rush Raffle is right around the corner (Friday, February 25) and Gold Rush Raffle Tickets will be available to purchase as early as the end of this week. Who was the top seller of Mustang Gold Rush Raffle Tickets last year for the Mustang Booster Club?

The first person to email me at MustangHoofPrints@SMSU.edu with the correct answer to this question will receive an SMSU t-shirt. The winner will be announced on The Saturday Morning Mustang Show between 9:00 am and 10:00 am on 1400AM each week.