2008 Woodie Awards
Cougar athletes excited for Division I move
Josh McCarty
Issue date: 7/30/08 Section: Sports
With over a year of hype and anticipation in the rearview mirror, the final moments tick down before the first SIUE Division I games will be played.
While positive results may be hard to come by early on with an elevated competition level, the opportunity to contend with top-level competition has many SIUE athletes excited.
Programs like softball, volleyball and tennis enjoyed successful seasons in their last year at the Division II level. Building off of that success becomes the challenge in the transition to Division I play.
"Having a good season last year is only another incentive to keep up what we have been doing and try to do it even better," SIUE sophomore tennis star Paulo Gonzalez said.
Both the men's and women's tennis teams made it to the conference tournament last season. Gonzalez earned Great Lakes Valley Conference freshman of the year honors for his 22-7 record at the No. 1 spot for the Cougars.
For Gonzalez and his teammates to continue the success on the courts, they will need to work even harder off the court.
"Expecting results is not something one should do," Gonzalez said. "The only thing that I expect for next year is double the intensity of training that we had last year, or even more."
In most cases, the athletes on the Division I level are bigger, stronger and faster than those at Division II. For the SIUE women's golf team, the tournament field will be full of more accomplished golfers than they faced last year.
"It is very exciting for us as a team to be able to step up and face some tougher and more competitive teams," SIUE senior golfer Lauren Rennie said. "I really believe that this will help us to build and improve our team even more this year."
While the new level of competition may lead to early struggles for SIUE athletics, it's the opportunity to test their abilities against the best that has SIUE junior golfer Kelsey Atteberry excited.
"It's going to be a new experience playing in larger tournaments and against new competition," Atteberry said. "The harder tournaments will definitely force us to play our best possible rounds and nothing less."
NCAA rules prohibit incoming Division I sports programs from competing for post-season honors right away, with the exception of the softball and men's soccer teams. These teams will be fast-tracked, meaning they can begin competing in two years. All of the other SIUE atheltic programs will wait five years before they are eligible for championships.
For some, this could be viewed as a deterrent, but for SIUE junior tennis player Rob Young, the opportunity presented to all 2008-09 Cougar athletes represents something larger than any trophy could account for.
"Twenty years from now when I'm in the business world, and SIUE is possibly winning championships, I can say I was on the first team to play Division I," said Young. "I think it's pretty neat to be a part of that transition."
While positive results may be hard to come by early on with an elevated competition level, the opportunity to contend with top-level competition has many SIUE athletes excited.
Programs like softball, volleyball and tennis enjoyed successful seasons in their last year at the Division II level. Building off of that success becomes the challenge in the transition to Division I play.
"Having a good season last year is only another incentive to keep up what we have been doing and try to do it even better," SIUE sophomore tennis star Paulo Gonzalez said.
Both the men's and women's tennis teams made it to the conference tournament last season. Gonzalez earned Great Lakes Valley Conference freshman of the year honors for his 22-7 record at the No. 1 spot for the Cougars.
For Gonzalez and his teammates to continue the success on the courts, they will need to work even harder off the court.
"Expecting results is not something one should do," Gonzalez said. "The only thing that I expect for next year is double the intensity of training that we had last year, or even more."
In most cases, the athletes on the Division I level are bigger, stronger and faster than those at Division II. For the SIUE women's golf team, the tournament field will be full of more accomplished golfers than they faced last year.
"It is very exciting for us as a team to be able to step up and face some tougher and more competitive teams," SIUE senior golfer Lauren Rennie said. "I really believe that this will help us to build and improve our team even more this year."
While the new level of competition may lead to early struggles for SIUE athletics, it's the opportunity to test their abilities against the best that has SIUE junior golfer Kelsey Atteberry excited.
"It's going to be a new experience playing in larger tournaments and against new competition," Atteberry said. "The harder tournaments will definitely force us to play our best possible rounds and nothing less."
NCAA rules prohibit incoming Division I sports programs from competing for post-season honors right away, with the exception of the softball and men's soccer teams. These teams will be fast-tracked, meaning they can begin competing in two years. All of the other SIUE atheltic programs will wait five years before they are eligible for championships.
For some, this could be viewed as a deterrent, but for SIUE junior tennis player Rob Young, the opportunity presented to all 2008-09 Cougar athletes represents something larger than any trophy could account for.
"Twenty years from now when I'm in the business world, and SIUE is possibly winning championships, I can say I was on the first team to play Division I," said Young. "I think it's pretty neat to be a part of that transition."
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