{"id":327,"date":"2015-03-23T16:08:49","date_gmt":"2015-03-23T23:08:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/?p=327"},"modified":"2015-03-23T16:08:49","modified_gmt":"2015-03-23T23:08:49","slug":"back-in-spring","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/2015\/03\/23\/back-in-spring\/","title":{"rendered":"Back In Spring"},"content":{"rendered":"

With the final stretch of 2014-15 well underway, California Baptist University is looking to add to its impressive list of accomplishments in NCAA Division II this spring. Both softball, baseball are aiming at qualifying for the NCAA playoffs for the second year in a row, along with men\u2019s and women\u2019s golf. Cheer is aiming at winning its third-consecutive NCA national title, and both distance track teams have individual NCAA glory on their minds.<\/p>\n

CBU women\u2019s golf resumed its season in the spring with a victory at the Super San Diego Championship, and followed it up with Tina Yang winning her first individual title of the season at the CBU Invitational where the Lancers took second. With top-10 finishes at all eight of its tournaments and five top-three marks, CBU has jumped to eighth in the NCAA Division II rankings, with top-10 finishes at all eight of its tournaments and five top-three marks this year.<\/p>\n

\"Tina_Yang1\"<\/a><\/p>\n

On the softball diamond, the Lancers opened the season with a top-25 ranking and had three players earn preseason honors. Belinda Renne was named the PacWest Preseason Pitcher of the Year and was joined on the preseason all-conference team by Savannah Miller and Krista Mann. CBU has since jumped to No. 13 in the Division II rankings, and are 28-6, 17-3 in conference about halfway through the season. They opened PacWest action with series wins over Holy Names, Notre Dame de Namur, Chaminade and sweeps of BYU-Hawaii, Hawaii Hilo and Academy of Art. Ashley DeVaere has been a dangerous weapon for the Lancer offense, leading the conference in RBIs, doubles, home runs and walks.<\/p>\n

\"soft\"<\/a><\/p>\n

The two-time National Cheerleaders Association championship CBU cheer team is ready to start another campaign for the coveted title. This year, the Lancers qualified a stunt group for nationals. Katarina McKnight, Briana Davee, Taylor Hendricksen, and Raven Rivera will compete at the USA College Championships on March 23 and then again at the NCA College Championship in April.<\/p>\n

Distance track is off to a very promising start this season. Through three events, the Lancer men and women\u2019s teams have combined to post 18 (11 men, seven women) top-10 performances. CBU showed it is starting to hit its stride at the Occidental Distance Carnival. Valentin Robert has stood out not only for CBU or in Division II, but in the nation at large. His time of eight minutes, 59.44 seconds in the steeplechase placed him second and was not only an NCAA Division II qualifying time but the fastest time for the event in Division II and the NCAA overall. Abel El-Hajjami also grabbed a B-cut and top-three time in Division II of 14:33.12 in the 5000 meter.<\/p>\n

\"abdel\"<\/a><\/p>\n

On the women\u2019s end of things, Caroline Barkechir set a new school record in the 3000 (10:06.35) and 5000-meter (17:02.36) events. Her 5K mark also gave her a B-cut for the Division II Championships. Katie Deimling also grabbed the program\u2019s first victory of the season, taking the steeplechase in 11:24.35.<\/p>\n

There has been a hot streak brewing in the Lancer Aquatics Center, as CBU women\u2019s water polo has won 10 of its past 11 matches, including seven straight to improve to 14-8 this season. Six of the Lancers\u2019 wins have come over NCAA Division I squads — Siena, Bucknell, George Washington, Iona and St. Francis. CBU will look to continue to build a full head of steam heading into the Golden Coast Conference Championships April 23rd<\/sup> to the 24th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n

After reaching the NCAA Division II West Region semifinals in its first year playoff eligibility, CBU baseball gave itself a challenge non-conference schedule with two four-game series with top-10 ranked opponents and took home a 17-3 shellacking of #3 Colorado Mesa and 3-2 win over #9 Cal Poly Pomona. The Lancers will have to battle through an equally daunting PacWest slate. After being picked to win the conference, with Andy Crowley also expected to repeat as the PacWest Player of the year in the preseason polls, four of the nine league squads are currently ranked in the NCBWA\u2019s top-10 West Region teams. CBU carries a 10-12, 2-2 in conference record into its second conference series with Hawaii Pacific, the No. 8 team in the region, at James W. Totman Stadium Saturday and Monday. CBU has been picked to win the PacWest title for the third time in four years, with Andy Crowley being named the conference preseason player of the year in the poll of the league’s coaches.<\/p>\n

With the spring season now in full swing, CBU men\u2019s golf has turned a new leaf with its young group. With the addition of sophomore Fresno State transfer Christian Sanders, the Lancers have produced top-seven finishes at their three spring tournaments. It started with a seventh-place showing at the primarily Division I Folino Invitational, followed by a bronze finish at the Coyote Classic and sixth-place showing at the St. Edward\u2019s Invitational. Phenomenal freshman Kavan Eubank has highlighted the Lancers\u2019 success and won consecutive PacWest Golfer of the Week awards after winning medalist honors at the Coyote Classic and going top-10 at the Folino Invite.<\/p>\n

Records have already been broken, with two single-season marks in jeopardy for a new-look Lancer men\u2019s volleyball, which stands at 6-15, 2-13 in the MPSF more than halfway through its schedule in the toughest conference in the country. In a sweep of UC Merced on January 10th<\/sup>, the Lancers attacked at a .627 percentage (36 kills, four errors in 51 attempts), which ranks second in CBU history and fourth in the MPSF since the rally-scoring era began in 2001. The Lancers also had 16 aces against the Bobcats, which tied a program high and is two off the MPSF\u2019s all-time record. Enrique de Diego Garcia\u2019s current 1.28 blocks-a-set average ranks him second on CBU\u2019s single-season list, and tied a single-match record with 16 blocks in a sweep of UC San Diego, which stood as a new three-set record. He also ranks 10th in single-season hitting percentage with a .385 mark. Coming off a 17-dig performance, Kevin Kustura has put up 2.13 digs a set this year, which is the fifth best average in a season for CBU.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With the final stretch of 2014-15 well underway, California Baptist University is looking to add to its impressive list of accomplishments in NCAA Division II this spring. Both softball, baseball are aiming at qualifying for the NCAA playoffs for the second year in a row, along with men\u2019s and women\u2019s golf. Cheer is aiming at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=327"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":332,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/327\/revisions\/332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=327"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=327"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.calbaptist.edu\/laa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=327"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}