The start of the athletic year for many Oswego State sports teams has been nothing short of spectacular. Nearly each team has seen success as the midway mark of the regular season inches closer.
The biggest story of the fall has been field hockey’s impressive 5-0 start. Grace Rinaldi has paced the Lakers offensively thus far with 10 points in five games. The return of Sarita Charap has also been a big improvement in goal from last season. Her presence alone makes the Lakers a better team.
The Lakers swept the field hockey Athlete of the Week awards after they moved to 4-0 last week. Charap took home SUNYAC field hockey Defensive Athlete of the Week to go along with her 1.01 goals against average on the season. Monica Harvey’s game-tying and game-winning goals last week against Elmira College earned her SUNYAC Offensive Athlete of the Week as well.
Golf has also gotten off to one of the better starts in their history. Coach Mike Howard has seen his team take home three first place finishes through four invitationals this season. A third place finish at the St. John Fisher College Invitational was their worst finish to date, but they were able to win their first match of the season at the Potsdam Quad by seven strokes. They also were able to top SUNY Delhi in the Keuka College Fall Invitational by six strokes for another first place finish. The 19th Annual Oswego Fall Invite was all Oswego State as well. Both the A and B team finished tied atop the leaderboard, with the B-team taking home the tiebreaker with Joshua Krause’s +9 score, beating out Kyle McCloskey’s A-team score of +11.
Women’s soccer seems to have all cylinders clicking on the pitch. Their 3-1-2 start has them in good position as they move into their SUNYAC schedule. The Lakers were able to sweep the women’s soccer SUNYAC Athlete of the Week awards as well. Emma Geyer won the Offensive Athlete of the Week award after Oswego State’s 2-0-1 record for the week. The Liverpool native scored twice against undefeated teams, once to help beat the Alfred University Saxons and another to draw with the St. Lawrence University Saints.
The Laker’s keeper, Melissa Siegfried, played well enough to garner the fourth SUNYAC Athlete of the Week award for Oswego State Athletics. Her defensive award came after two clean sheet victories. These not only helped the Lakers earn two wins, but also cemented her into Oswego State women’s soccer history books for both wins and shutouts.
Geyer and Siegfried would also win the ECAC Athletes of the Week for their respective positions.
The volleyball team is another Laker squad that has impressed in pre-SUNYAC play. Oswego State has seen their victories come in dominating fashion thus far. Five of their eight wins have come in straight sets and the other three have seen the Lakers only dropping one set.
They sit at 8-5 on the year, but only after a rough weekend at the Stevens Institute of Technology Ducks Classic where they dropped three of four matches to quality opponents.
Both the men’s and women’s cross country teams have seen success as well. The men’s team has a second place finish at the SUNY Poly Wildcat Invitational and a third place finish in their home invite on Sept. 10. The women’s team hasn’t finished as high as the men’s, but still has two top five finishes to their name.
This impressive start needs to be kept up as SUNYAC play begins to start, but as of right now thank you, Oswego State sports. Thanks for making my job that much easier.
