Baylor tennis programs each hosting NCAA regionals
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Athletics, Honors
It’s been a good three days for Baylor’s tennis programs.
Sunday, the No. 3-ranked women beat #20 Texas to claim the program’s third straight Big 12 Conference Tournament title, while the 11th-ranked men (playing without their top player) upset the No. 7 Longhorns to win the conference tournament for the fourth time in five years. This on the heels of both programs winning the regular season conference title, as well.
The past week’s championships give Baylor’s athletic department 20 Big 12 Championships in the past five years. Only Texas has won more in that period. In all, the Bears have won 29 Big 12 championships in the league’s 12-year history; Baylor won exactly 29 Southwest Conference titles in 81 years of SWC membership.
Monday, the conference announced that the Baylor women had swept the 2008 All-Big 12 awards, claiming the Player (Zuzana Zemenova), Freshman (Taylor Ormond), Newcomer (Jelena Stanivuk) and Coach (Joey Scrivano) of the Year. Zemenova became the first athlete in Big 12 history to be named Player of the Year four straight years in any sport. Three other Lady Bears and three Baylor men were named to the All-Big 12 teams.
Tuesday, the programs learned that, for the third straight year, they would each host NCAA First and Second Round action. The women are the tournament’s No. 5 seed and will face Oral Roberts in the first round May 9. The men were named the No. 9 seed and begin the tournament May 10, also against Oral Roberts. Baylor is one of only two schools to have both the men and women ranked among the top 9 seeds.
Sic ’em, Baylor tennis!
A look ahead at this fall’s freshman class
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Baylor 2012, Academics, Student life
Part of Baylor’s Vision 2012 has been to attract a top-tier student body by “recruiting students with strong academic records and characters consistent with Baylor’s mission” — outstanding students like Alana Akers, Miriam Garcia and Andrew McCleskey. These three students have each chosen Baylor and are just a sampling of the 3,000-plus students who will begin classes this fall.
* Akers, an incoming freshman from Beaumont, Texas, is a National Merit finalist and an aspiring doctor who has already been shadowing a pediatrician on a weekly basis (pictured at right). The Beaumont Enterprise profiled her here.
* Garcia is one of four El Paso-area students who received Gates Millennium Scholarships, given to top minority students with financial need. Garcia is the No. 2 student in her class and chose Baylor over schools like Notre Dame, Texas Tech and TCU. The El Paso Times wrote about her and the other local Gates Millennium Scholars.
* McCleskey, a Richardson, Texas, native, was highlighted by The Dallas Morning News in their ongoing series of “Good Kids.” An Eagle Scout and mission work volunteer, McCleskey plans to major in film and digital media at Baylor.
We are truly blessed at Baylor to have student after student with backgrounds like these entering year after year.
Sic ’em, incoming freshmen!
UIL regionals, Premiere serve as introductions to Baylor for high school students
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Student life
Over 2,000 of the state’s brightest high school students flooded Baylor’s campus this month for the University Interscholastic League (UIL) regional finals. The academic and theatrical competitions were held April 11-12, followed by the athletic contests this past week.
This weekend was also Spring Premiere; prospective students and their families (totaling over 3,500 guests) visited campus to learn about Baylor as they prepare to decide which college to attend.
I love that so many of the state’s best students get such a great exposure to Baylor and its campus. We have such a beautiful campus and such great people that it makes a world of difference in students’ opinions when they actually get to come visit.
Sic ’em, future Baylor students and the faculty/staff who help host these events!
Former softball standout’s health scare rallied Baylor family
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Just for Fun, Alumni, Athletics
Baylor fans know Cristin Vitek as the softball pitcher who struck out an NCAA-record 28 batters in a 16-inning 1-0 win during the 2004 NCAA Regional — the exceptional athlete seen in this picture. But all her athletic achievements meant nothing earlier this year when she spent three weeks in the hospital, her family worried at times if she would even survive.
Thankfully, she is now on the road to recovery and was healthy enough to throw out the first pitch before Wednesday night’s softball game. The Baylor Lariat and Waco Tribune-Herald each ran nice features on what she’s been through; the Viteks shared how the Baylor family immediately sprung into action with prayers for Cristin’s health, plus phone calls, text messages and e-mails of encouragement.
It’s so great to see the Baylor community banding around a brother or sister in their time of need. And in this case, it’s great to see Cristin back up and headed towards full health.
Sic ’em, Cristin, and sic ’em, Baylor family!
Former dean honored for his return to the classroom
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Academics, Honors
Longtime Baylor professor Dr. Wallace Daniel is this year’s Cornelia Marschall Smith Professor of the Year. As such, Daniel will receive $20,000 and will present a public lecture on campus later this fall.
If you’re thinking, “Didn’t we just hear someone else named professor of the year?”, the answer is “sort of.” Dr. Mona Choucair, an English department lecturer, won this year’s Collins Outstanding Professor Award as voted on by this year’s senior class. To my way of thinking, it’s wonderful that we have more than enough great teachers to have multiple awardwinners every year!
The Cornelia Marschall Smith Award honoree is selected by a faculty committee based on the nominees’ teaching, research and service. Daniel came to Baylor in 1971 as an assistant history professor and since then has led the Honors Program, chaired the department of history, and served as dean of the College of Arts and Sciences before returning to the classroom in 2005.
Sic ’em, Dr. Daniel!
Equestrian excels at nationals as host
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Athletics, Honors
Last weekend, Baylor hosted the Varsity Equestrian National Championships — the second straight year that the Bears have played host. In fact, Baylor will host the championships at the Heart O’ Texas Fair Complex next spring, too.
Of all the NCAA championships, only baseball hosts its championship in the same city every year. Could Waco follow in Omaha’s footsteps? Baylor equestrian fans can only hope so.
In the meantime, there’s plenty of success in the arena to cheer about. Junior Nicole Brown fell two points shy of winning the program’s first national championship over the weekend, losing 162-160 in the Equitation Over Fences title match. (The Waco Tribune-Herald ran a nice feature on Brown here.) Baylor’s hunter seat team also posted its best-ever finish at nationals, placing sixth.
(If you don’t quite get the terminology, BaylorBears.com has a pretty good FAQ here. My wife, a former Baylor Riding Association member, has helped me learn the sport.)
Sic ’em, Baylor equestrian!
Baylor senior beats the odds in earning Goldwater Scholarship
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Student life, Honors
Baylor senior Juan Yaquian’s life story could easily have turned out differently. At age 9, Juan’s father left the family, forcing his mother to work multiple jobs. But instead of following the easy path to trouble, Juan dedicated himself to his studies.
His hard work paid off, as Yaquian will graduate next May with a degree in electrical and computer engineering. Last week, he got some more good news — he received the Barry M. Goldwater Scholarship, the top undergrad award in the country for math, the natural sciences and engineering.
As a Goldwater Scholar, Yaquian’s award will cover tuition, fees, books, room and board up to $7,500 for one year as he continues his education. His long list of honors is impressive, but I’m even more impressed by his attitude. Here’s what he had to say after winning the award:
“I feel that I have been blessed just to have the opportunity to attend college because a college education was never guaranteed to me, so I never forget to thank the Lord for everything I accomplish in college and in life.”
Sic ’em, Juan!
Diadeloso 2008
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Photo Galleries, Just for Fun, Student life
Baylor students, faculty and staff celebrated Diadeloso 2008 on Thursday with the usual tournament games, but also with increased community involvement from on-campus student organizations and Waco-area businesses.
This year’s event marked the 74th annual Diadeloso, as the tradition dates back to the first “play day” in the spring of 1934. To put that in perspective, that same spring, Bonnie and Clyde were still on the run, and Shirley Temple was just preparing for her first starring film role.
Click here for a photo gallery from this year’s Diadeloso, covering everything from tug of war to the Dia Dog Show. And don’t forget to find the Dia events being held in your city in the coming weeks!
Sic ’em, Bears!
Baylor boasts Big 12 champs in men’s and women’s tennis
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Athletics, Honors
For the fourth straight year, Baylor is home to both the men’s and women’s Big 12 Conference tennis regular season champions. Think about that for a minute; it means that this year’s graduating class in each program has never known anything but winning conference championships!
The No. 3-ranked Baylor women finished the year a perfect 11-0 in Big 12 play, 25-2 overall, with both losses coming against teams that were ranked No. 1 in the nation at the time. The Lady Bears have won four straight Big 12 titles and five out of the last six; over the last four seasons, they have rolled up a conference record of 43-1.
The 13th-ranked men, meanwhile, finished the regular season 5-1 in the Big 12, 19-8 overall. The team tied for the conference title with Texas, landing the Bears their seventh straight Big 12 championship and their eighth in the conference’s 12-year history.
Combined, the Baylor tennis programs have won 11 of the last 12 Big 12 tennis titles over the past six years — a time period that just happens to correspond with women’s coach Joey Scrivano’s start at Baylor and men’s coach Matt Knoll’s promotion to Director of Tennis Operations. Coincidence? I think not.
Sic ’em, Baylor tennis!
Baylor students take a cue from ‘Gilligan’s Island’
Posted by The Baylor Proud Team in : Student life, Research
Watching reruns of Gilligan’s Island growing up, my favorite character was always the Professor; I loved the way he could build anything, it seemed, out of a couple of coconuts.
Baylor students are working on something similar — working to design multiple low-cost products that can be created from coconuts in poor coastal regions, where the fruit is an abundant, renewable resource. The researchers hope that by developing technologies and a business model, the value of farmers’ coconuts in places like the Philippines, Ghana and Mexico will increase from 5 cents to 50 cents each, multiplying their annual income 10 times.
The team showed off its work last month at the National Collegiate Inventors & Innovators Alliance meeting in Dallas. Graduate student Stanton Greer, the team’s leader, exemplifies Baylor’s mission; I like what he had to say about displaying their work at the convention:
“We are very excited about the opportunity for more people to find out about what we are doing to serve Christ. It is an honor to be put in the same class with so many other great projects and schools and to be able to bring glory to God on such a large stage.”
Sic ’em, Baylor coconut researchers!
