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Seven of eight place in top five and earn All-American honors
Tue, 1 Apr 2003
Lake Orion, Michigan - Seven of eight UM-Morris women wrestlers placed in the United States Girl's Wrestling Association (USGWA) North American Collegiate Freestyle Championships which was good enough for a third place team finish. The event was sanctioned by USA Wrestling and was open to all U.S. and Canadian collegiate programs.
Patrice Crenshaw, a sophomore (East Point, GA) placed second at 114 pounds. Crenshaw defeated Cathy Migita of the University of Hawaii 6-0, then dominated the number one ranked wrestler in the U.S. Marianne Vollmer of Missour Valley College 6-1. In the finals, Crenshaw lost to former U.S. National and Junior World Team member Danielle Hobieka of Harvard University by fall.
Freshman Sharon Jacobson (El Cajon, CA) placed third at 133 pounds. Jacobson pinned Raquel MagDalene of Menlo College in 3:37, and pinned Melissa Deiman of Pacific University in 1:15.
Liz Short, a sophomore (Lombard, IL) placed 4th at 107 pounds. Short won 13-2 over Andrea Giacomozzi of Bridgewater State and 10-0 versus Monica Harris of Missouri Valley College.
Freshman Ranae Faaborg (Radcliffe, IA) placed 4th at 138 pounds, the highlight coming with a "lateral drop" for three points and a fall versus the Linse Meadows of Neosho County College. This was Faaborg's best finish this season.
Tabithia Ramsey (Austin, TX) placed a solid fourth at 114 pounds. Ramsey defeated Everdith Landraw of American International College by fall in 2:56 and downed Tonya Mikaski of Menlo College by a 7-4 decision.
Junior Katie Ross (Greensboro, NC) placed fifth at 128 pounds. Ross won by fall versus Teresa Dal Ben of Menlo College in 5:07, defeated Amanda Noteware of Princeton University 13-5, and won a 7-2 decision versus Kristen Rafanen of Missouri Valley College.
UM-Morris head coach Doug Reese was pleased with his team's results. "We had a long layoff," said Reese. "Our last competition was on February 1st in Canada. It was good to be back in competition again, but I didn't know how the layoff and coming off spring break would affect us."
"We just wanted to take a giant step forward this weekend. Win or lose we just wanted to get better as we approach our goal of U.S. Senior Nationals in Las Vegas on May 10th. We really did that today," noted Reese.
UM-Morris came into the competition ranked seventh in North America and ended up with a third place finish.
"Our team was focused and wrestled extremely well mentally - where we shined this weekend was in our tactics. When we wrestle within each individuals game plan, we win. That was the difference this weekend. It was a good sign of a young team maturing," said Reese.
"Rankings are alot of spin, a lot of hype," said Reese. "We proved a lot this weekend, you can't count us out of anything."
The next competition for the Cougar women will be the FILA-Junior World Team Trials at St. Ben's College in St. Joseph on Saturday, April 12th. Champions of this event will represent the United States in the Junior World Championships in Athens, Greece in late August.
Katie Ross use a tight cradle on Amanda Noteware of Princeton University in the USGWA North American Championships. Ross won this match 13-5 and placed fifth at 128 pounds. (photo Doug Reese)
Liz Short scores exposure points on Monica Harris of Missouri Valley in the consolation semi-finals of the USGWA North American Championships. Short won with a techincal superiority, 10-0.
The University of Minnesota-Morris women's wrestling team placed third at the USGWA North American Championships in Lake Orion, MI. Seven of eight UMM wrestlers earned All-American honors. (photo Doug Reese).