Yokopovich fills stat sheet in season-opening loss
Special to the OBSERVER
GRANVILLE, Ohio — Fredonia’s women lacrosse season got off to a rocky start Saturday with a 17-9 loss to Denison at Piper Field.
The Big Red led from start to finish in securing the season opening win, the first over the Blue Devils in three meetings. A freshman, Kiely Noonan, had five goals and Claire Ludlow three goals for Denison.
Fredonia was led in scoring by freshman Madeline Haney with three goals. Audrey Yokopovich, a junior, added two goals and was the team leader with five draw controls, four groundballs, and five caused turnovers.
Down 2-0 early in the first half, Haney scored the first Blue Devil goal of the season, then added goals before halftime, which ended with Denison up 12-4.
Kershner’s goal, with 12 seconds left in the half, was the start of a 4-0 run carrying over to the second half as Fredonia pulled within five goals, 12-7. That was as close as the Blue Devils got the rest of the way. They were outshot 33-15 which left junior goalkeeper Nicole Burrows to make seven saves.
Fredonia is back in action 1 p.m. Sunday at Mount Union.
Indoor Track & Field
Fredonia teams fourth after Friday session
BROCKPORT — Fredonia senior throwers Kyle Brown and Joseph Gabrielli accounted for all of the Blue Devils’ scoring Saturday during the 2017 SUNYAC Indoor Track & Field Championship meet.
Brown finished third and Gabrielli fourth in the 35-pound weight throw to earn six and five points, respectively. Brown’s throw covered 17.04 meters (55 feet, 11 inches), fractions short of his personal-best (17.06), while Gabrielli went 14.79 meters (48-6-1/4).
Personal-bests included a 9:12.86 clocking in the 3,000 meters plus two new marks by senior Brendan Long in the heptathlon. Long sprinted 9.96 seconds in the 60-meter hurdles one day after a personal-best 5.68 meters in the long jump. He was 11th and senior Mitchel Paciga ninth in the heptathlon standings.
Fredonia slid to sixth place after finishing Friday in fourth while Buffalo State ascended into a tie for fourth place to earn two points in the Battle of Lake Erie, a season-long, multi-sport competition between the Western New York sister schools.
In the women’s events, Fredonia junior Brittany Feldman made good on her top seed while winning the women’s 400-meter dash at the 2017 SUNYAC Indoor Track & Field championship meet Saturday.
Feldman raced to the win in 57.31 seconds inside the Brockport Special Events & Recreation Center. She had a preliminary time of 57.84 seconds Saturday on top of a season-best 57.60 seconds coming into the meet. She ranked No. 16 on the NCAA D3 qualifying list at the start of the weekend.
Feldman’s 10 first-place points and eight second-place points earned by junior jumper Sarah Couperus were the top Fredonia scores Saturday. Couperus finished second in the high jump by clearing 1.57 meters (5-1-3/4).
Other individual points by came in the 3,000 meters as sophomore Hannah Kurbs finished seventh and sophomore Brenna Donovan eighth. Both ran personal bests: 10:29.83 by Kurbs, 10:36.22 by Donovan.
Also recording personal-bests were sophomore Carly DeBono in the mile with a time of 5:29.40, and junior Rachel Williams (Lockport, N.Y.) in the 20-pound weight throw with a distance of 13.61 meters (44-8).
Fredonia was seventh and Buffalo State fifth in the team standings, earning the Bengals two points in the season-long Battle of The Lake series.
Swimming & Diving
Regional wins
for Devil duo
ITHACA — Two Fredonia Blue Devil seniors were on the top of the podium Saturday at the NCAA Region 4 Springboard Diving championship meet at Ithaca College.
Meghan Bartlett won the women’s 1-meter with 462.95 points one day after finishing second in the women’s 3-meter. Conversely, Arron Carlson won the men’s 3-meter Saturday with 573.15 points; he was the men’s 1-meter champ Friday.
Both are guaranteed a spot at the NCAA Division III championship meet March 15-18 in Shenandoah, Texas.
Also competing this weekend at Ithaca was senior Sam Kowalewski among the women, and senior Jake Storms and Christian Krasnek among the women.