By Chuck Matthews

The team did well due to the great efforts of Chris Ford, Scott Grabowski and Ryan Meyers. Chris Ford, the regional champ in both singles and doubles, won his first match at nationals but faced the second place finisher in the second round and lost in the second round of that match. Chris Ford's partner in doubles was Scott Gruboski.

Ryan Meyers was third in singles and second in doubles competition at regionals.

Ford, Gruboski, and Meyers are all planning on returning this year. Due to the return of these players and the strength of the new players coming in, coach Perez expects to have a top ten team this year.

Freshmen Ryan Blanko, Rob Washo, and Kevin Olesen are expected to join the team, as is transfer student Nathan Goodwin. Nathan is an exchange student from Belgium. He plans on transferring to IVCC because of the changes to the tennis program in Lake County.

The team will be warming up in a tournament on October 6-8; the season starts in March 2001.

Softball

Cory Tomasson, softball coach, led his young team through a tough season last spring. The team ended 7-13 in the conference and 8-14 overall.

Named to the All-Conference team were Casey Novotney and Christina Youngsma. Casey was the team's shortstop. She led the team in doubles, RBI's, and total hits. She also had the team's second highest batting average.

Youngsma was behind the plate. She led the team in triples and although she started slow at the plate, ended the season as the team's lead off hitter, ending at over .300.

The team's two starting pitchers, Jaime Schwarz and Tahnee Cochran did well, Tomasson said. He said their pitching was especially impressive since they usually pitched the whole game, due to the absence of relief pitchers. Most games were double-headers.

"Last year's team did a tremendous job," the coach said.

The team was young and needs improvement in defense, he added, but much of it was due to the new strategy presented in college play.

For this season, all but four players are expected back. Ten new recruits will join the team . The team is currently practicing and will have five games this fall. During spring break they will be at Disney World for spring training.

Coach Tomasson said he hopes to strengthen the defense and add support to the bats. He is optimistic for this season and feels that the team has a shot at becoming the conference champs.

Baseball

The baseball team, lead by coach Bob Koopman took second place in the conference with a record of 8-2 and a record of 38-12 overall.

Joe Sester kept the batter's box hot with a .325 batting average, 16 home runs, and 82 RBI's. The starting shortstop, Jason McStoots, hit a great .423.

Pitchers Dave Nitz and Ryan Bailey had great seasons. Dave had a record of 7-2 with an ERA of 3.81. Ryan had a record of 6-1 with 7 saves. Jeff Weber also threw well with a record of 5-3.

All of those players are back for another season, and Koopman said he is optimistic about the upcoming spring. He was, however, reluctant to make any predictions before the eight weeks of training and games this fall.