FHSU Athletics

Fort Hays State women’s golf finished fifth at the Virginia McCoy Intercollegiate held by Park University in Parkville, Mo. Samantha Hobson led the way for FHSU at The Deuce at the National Golf Club, a par-70 layout, by finishing fourth individually.

Hobson, much like her performance last week at the UNK Invite, vaulted up the leaderboard with a strong second round. She shot a four-over par 76 on Tuesday after shooting 84 on Monday. The improvement saw her move from ninth to fourth in the individual standings, carding a total of 160. She was 12 strokes off the winning pace of 148, shot by Damla Bilgic of Iowa Western Community College.

Hobson finished 21 strokes ahead of  Quillen Eichhorn, the next finisher for FHSU. Eichhorn shot rounds of 90 and 91 for a total of 181 and a 22nd-place finish. Abby Schmidtberger tied for 23rd, two strokes back of Eichhorn with rounds of 92 and 91. Megan DeWerff bounced back from a first-day 96 to shoot 88 the next and finish in a tie for 26th. Hadley Tharp also competed, shooting rounds of 107 and 94 to finish in 43rd.

FHSU finished fifth as a team, shooting a total of 708. Iowa Western won the tournament with a 661, followed by Ottawa University at 684 and Truman at 687.

The Tigers return to action in two weeks at the MIAA Championships in Lawrence, Kan., at Alvamar Golf Course (April 20-21).

FHSU Athletics

Fort Hays State women’s soccer coach Craig Shaw announced the signings of nine student-athletes for the 2015 season.  Eight of the nine players will be incoming freshman while one junior college transfer will join the team.  Six signees hail from Colorado, while Kansas, Nebraska and Texas each have one representative.  Position breakdown of the signing class includes one goalkeeper, one outside/center back hybrid, two center backs, two midfielders and three forwards.

FHSU completed its fourth season of women’s soccer in 2014 and compiled a 13-5-2 record, just missing a berth to the NCAA Tournament. The Tigers ended the regular season with an eight-game unbeaten streak and won their MIAA Tournament first round game over Missouri Western at home.
A complete list of the team’s commitments is below…

Jessica Babyak
Freshman, Center Back
Austin, Texas
McNeil High School

Megan Kneefel
Freshman, Goalkeeper
Aurora, Colo.
Smokey Hill High School

Savannah Mclease
Freshman, Forward
Lakewood, Colo.
Jefferson County Open School

Cassi Moosburger
Freshman, Forward
Arvada, Colo.
Arvada West High School

CheyAnn Queener
Junior, Center Back
Colorado Springs, Colo.
Laramie County Community College

Taylor Rodriguez
Freshman, Midfielder
Grand Island, Neb.
Grand Island Senior High School

Jenna Schemmel
Freshman, Forward
Longmont, Colo.
Silver Creek High School

Taryn Schnell
Freshman, Outside Back/Center Back
Littleton, Colo.
Bear Creek High School

Taylor Spencer
Freshman, Midfielder
Winfield, Kan.
Winfield High School

FHSU Athletics

Fort Hays State men’s golf finished eighth as a team at the rain-shortened Lindenwood Invitational in St. Charles, Mo. The tournament was held at Missouri Bluffs Golf Club, a par-71 course in St. Charles.

Trey Herman led the way for FHSU by shooting a 4-over par 75 in round one and a 1-under par 70 in the second round to finish at 3-over par overall. His score of 145 tied for 10th. Dylan Wonnacott shot 2-over and 3-over (73 and 74) to finish in a tie for 14th with a total of 147. Grant Storey gave the Tigers rounds of 79 and 80 to tie for 43rd. Kade Megaffin carded 82 and 90 to finish alone in 53rd, while Micah Fabarez shot 97 and 88 to finish alone in 55th.

Herman was just six strokes back of the individual medalist, Andrew Huseman of Indian Hills Community College, who shot 3-under par overall (139). Indian Hills had three of the top four performers in the tournament and won the event with a team score of 567. Lindenwood was second at its home meet with a total of 580. FHSU shot 621 as a team.

FHSU returns to action next week (Apr. 13-14) at the Washburn Invitational, one of the MIAA sanctioned events for the season. It will be the final meet before the MIAA Championships.

FHSU Athletics

Estafania Lopez shattered the FHSU women’s javelin record on Saturday at the ESU Relays in Emporia, Kan. Lopez posted the nation’s best mark in the event so far, throwing 169’7.25″. She helped the Tigers to a fifth-place finish at the meet.

Lopez topped the school’s previous “new model” javelin record of 160’9″ set by Makayla McPhail in 2012. Teammate Madison Wolf had thrown the second-best effort in the nation last week at the Alex Francis Classic in Hays at 160’3″, but Lopez moved into the top spot nationally by over nine feet. Wolf finished third in the event on Saturday with a throw of 145’11.5″, while Megan Honas was fourth with a throw of 143’6.75″ to move up the national provisional mark list.

FHSU won three other events at the meet. Danille Berry posted a provisional qualifying mark in the high jump, winning with a height of 5’7″. That ties the seventh-best effort nationally so far. Alex Keehn won the 5,000 meters in a time of 18:49.53 to top a field of six runners. The 4×800-meter relay team won in a time of 10:18.25.

The Tigers scored 83 points as a team to finish fifth out of 14 teams. Missouri-Kansas City won the meet with 181 points, while Central Missouri was second at 124.5 points.

Keehn breaks school record in 10,000 meters
Fort Hays State’s Cory Keehn broke the FHSU 10,000-Meter Run Record and posted the third-fastest time nationally in the event at the San Francisco State Distance Carnival in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday. The majority of the track team was in action at the ESU Relays in Emporia, Kan., where the Tigers took sixth as a team.

Keehn ran a time of 29:44.68 in the event to finish second and post a solid provisional qualifying mark. He was just three seconds off the pace of unattached runner Andreas Ahwall. Keehn topped two other runners that ran sub-30:00, Blake Taneff of Ohio State and Aaron Mora of Chico State. Teammate Jonny Burnansky finished 16th in the event in 30:30.08, also obtaining a provisional mark. Michael Kinuthia was just three-tenths of a second short of getting a provisional in the 1500 meters with a time of 3:52.35.

Fort Hays State generated 57 points as a team at the ESU Relays in Emporia, Kan., finishing sixth out of 12 teams. FHSU did not have any top three finishers individually, but had one fourth-place and three fifth-place finishers. The 4×800-meter relay team finished third.

The Fort Hays State baseball team split their doubleheader with Missouri Western Saturday at Larks Park to win their first conference series of the season. After rallying for a pair of walkoff wins on Friday, the Tigers score four in the bottom of the seventh to to take game one 8-7. The Griffons score nine runs in the top of the first and go on to win game game two 9-5. FHSU is now 10-22 and 8-16 in the MIAA while the Griffons move to 19-5 and 13-11 in the conference.

The Griffons scored three runs in the top of the seventh to take a 7-4 lead in the first game but Connor Ross hit a two-out, three-run homer to tie the game. Caleb Cherryholmes followed with a solo shot on a 2-2 pitch to give teh Tigers the win.

Despite giving up three runs – one earned – in the top of the seventh, Giles Fox picks up the win in relief. Ross and Cherryholmes both had three RBIs.

The Griffons hit two home runs in the top of the first to grab a 9-0 lead in game two. The Tigers tallied single runs in the second, third, fifth, sixth and ninth innings.

Tiger starter Alex Cox lasted just 2/3 of an inning, giving up five runs on five hits and takes the loss. Justin Hersch pitched 8 1/3 innings of scoreless relief, scattering seven hits and striking out four. Connor Ross and Keven Czarnecki both had two hits and Nick Hammeke homered.