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The Fall Sports Roundup
January/February 2008
by Jess Notebaert ’08

Apart from the football team’s exhilarating but failed attempt to win it all (see The Game), Yale’s female athletes dominated the fall 2007 season. In total, women’s soccer, field hockey, volleyball, and cross-country notched two all-American nods, six first-team All-Ivy honors, and two second-place conference finishes.

 

Of the men’s teams, only crew and coed sailing saw a significant measure of success.

The top single performer was runner Lindsay Donaldson ’08, who finished her Yale career with her sixth All-American award. The field hockey captain, Harriet Thayer ’08, also was chosen as an All-American. Thayer helped put the exclamation point on the end of the team’s six-game winning streak with an assist during the Elis’ dramatic 2–1 overtime win over archrival Harvard in mid-October. Field hockey head coach Pam Stuper praised Thayer’s work ethic, saying, “Hers will be big shoes to fill!”

In an impressive demonstration of resilience, the women’s soccer team rebounded from a 1–4 start to go 4–1 in its last five games, including four straight wins to close out the season and finish just one win behind first-place Penn. Their comeback nearly earned the women an NCAA tournament showing. “Even with the letdown of falling short, I think we had a very strong season,” captain Mary Kuder ’08 said, “and one that I foresee the team building on next year.” (Most of the team will be back.)

On the volleyball courts, no one could touch Princeton, which finished undefeated in Ivy League play this fall. Yale and Penn, both 10–4 in the Ivy League, tied for second.

The women’s crew had high expectations after winning the 2007 NCAA championship last May, and they did well, taking second place among collegiate teams at the Head of the Charles regatta and fourth overall, the same place they captured during last year’s championship run. “This fall was a good time to get back into workouts, bring some of the younger rowers into the mix, and get a general refresher of the Yale stroke,” first varsity boat member Jamie Redman ’08 said.

Of the men’s teams, only crew and coed sailing saw a significant measure of success. The heavyweight crew finished eighth at the Head of the Charles and second at the Princeton Chase, heading toward the spring championship season with ever-improving results. The sailing team collected a plethora of top-five finishes across the northeast this fall as it geared up for spring competition.  the end

  
 

Sports shorts

The men’s basketball team played its usual brutal pre-Ivy schedule in November and December, losing to Stanford, number-two-ranked UCLA, and Holy Cross, among others. Victories over Sacred Heart, Fairfield, and Vermont gave the team a 3–6 record going into the winter break. The women’s team had a 2–5 record at the end of the fall term.

Two standout hockey players—Jeff Hamilton ’01, all-time Eli career points leader; and Chris Higgins ’05, the highest draft pick in Yale history (14th in the first round with the Montreal Canadiens)—continue their National Hockey League careers. Hamilton, a center who has played for the Islanders and the Blackhawks, now skates with the Carolina Hurricanes. Higgins plays left wing for the Canadiens. In total, 11 Bulldogs have played in the NHL.

Swimmer Alex Righi ’09 is making progress in his bid to join the 2008 US Olympic team. At the Short Course National Championships in Atlanta in early December, Righi scored all of Yale’s points in the Bulldogs’ fifth-place finish. The competitors included six-time Olympic gold medalist Michael Phelps, who beat Righi in the 100-yard freestyle final by slightly more than eight-tenths of a second.

In a competition that bodes well for the upcoming season, five members of the men’s squash squad teamed up on December 9 to capture their division title at the US National Championships. The Bulldogs swept each of their matches at the Brady Squash Center against the Lake Forest (Illinois) Squash Club.
 
 
 
 
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