After a roller coaster of a season, men and women’s track and field ended the season with a trip to the Ohio Valley Conference championship, taking multiple top three finishes.

Pro Wrestling Epic brought stunts including tables and chairs, six wrestlers in the ring at once and glow sticks to Alton, Illinois in their “Unsigned and Upset” event.  

Baseball

SIUE Athletic Director, Tim Hall, is appointed to the NCAA Softball Selection Committee through the help of the Ohio Valley conference.

Reflecting on their recent win and the previous weeks of the season, the Cougars remain focused on the OVC Championship.

SIUE Tennis will be playing in the Ohio Valley Conference championship for the first time since 2017 after winning their match against Tennessee State. 

SIUE men’s soccer coaching staff got a new addition with the hiring of Jordan Grant.  The team has been without an assistant coach since Nov. of 2021 and recently hired Grant in March 2022. 

The most recent Late Night at the MUC event was mini golf in the Meridian Ballroom, with a glow-in-the-dark twist.  

The Cougars won their first Ohio Valley Conference series of the year against UT Martin, with two back-to-back shutouts for the first time in their OVC history.

Despite an early lead, the Cougars took their first home loss of the season with an 18-11 defeat to Western Illinois.

After not being able to compete last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, club sports are now able to compete as normal, with women’s club basketball even getting to travel to Nebraska.  

SIUE Tennis remains undefeated this season after securing a win over Bradley University. The team is now nationally ranked, the first time in the program’s D1 history. 

SOFTBALL

Two Cougar baseball players are projected to be top hitters this season, an honor for which they were recognized with preseason Ohio Valley Conference awards. 

Head baseball coach Sean Lyons said he’s optimistic about the upcoming season, as the team is finally in a position where they have veteran players on the offensive side and the mound. 

In a match against Tennessee Tech, an OVC top three school, the Cougars started the game strong and maintained a close game, until eventually losing 68-64.

In their first match against William Woods University, women’s tennis won 7-0 in their third-straight shutout win.  

Redshirt freshman forward DeeJuan Pruitt from Sacramento, California, scored a dunk with 15 seconds left in the game, barely seizing a 61-60 win for the Cougars.

SIUE Tennis has turned a tide in the past few years, thanks to a new head coach and strong recruits. 

SIUE’s student athletes have earned the second-highest combined GPA in the program’s history. The average GPA was 3.436, which is 0.6 higher than the average GPA for D1 athletes.

After the original game was postponed due to COVID-19, SIUE lost to MSU after a hard-fought game, losing by a single basket in the final few seconds of the game. 

The Cougars took two heavy losses on Sunday 34-4 to Central Michigan and 29-3 to South Dakota State.

The Cougars will be seeing a change in opponents next season when Murray State and Belmont leave the Ohio Valley Conference  and join the Missouri Valley Conference, while the University of Arkansas at Little Rock joins the OVC in July. 

The Cougars fell 80-64 to Belmont after a rough start, giving Belmont an eight point lead by 11:45 that they never lost.

SIUE women’s basketball played its first game after two weeks of postponed games. They faced off with Southeast Missouri State University while the Cougars are missing several key players, due to COVID-19, and played with only nine dressed players. 

Athletic leaders hope that giving out free home game tickets to local kids and amateur teams will build a relationship with the community and inspire athletes. 

Over winter break, SIUE’s Men’s Basketball, Women’s Basketball and Wrestling teams played numerous games despite many postponements and cancellations.

Six schools competed last week in the Cougar Clash, a wrestling competition hosted by SIUE.

Head Coach Brian Barone was promoted from assistant coach of men’s basketball in March of 2019 and has since worked to build the program up. 

Samantha Smith, head coach of the women’s basketball team, leads the new coaching staff with a faster-paced playing style and helping players excel on and off the court. 

With Knox College repeatedly waiting out the shot timer and SIUE deftly dodging through the defenses, the men’s basketball team took their first win of the season.

The SIUE Men’s soccer team took a tough loss at home in the Missouri Valley Conference quarterfinals against Bradley, losing 2-1. 

SIUE Athletics joins the SIUE Foundation in Giving Tuesday, a fundraising initiative the university has participated in since 2014 in hopes of raising support for individual teams within the Athletics department. 

The women’s soccer team brought home several Ohio Valley Conference awards, including two players winning Player of the Year awards and two freshman earning spots on the All-Newcomer team.

The game was off to a rough start, with the SIUE Cougars being down by seven points in the first quarter.

Women’s soccer were crowned the Ohio Valley Conference Champions over the weekend. This is the second consecutive time women’s soccer has won the OVC Championship games and will now move on to the NCAA Division I Soccer Championship games to play on a national stage. 

After an intense day of gaming, the Esports Club took the day with wins in all five game categories against SIUC.

Despite a strong first half, men’s basketball faltered in the final half, and suffered  a defeat from Quincy University in an exhibition on Thursday. 

With 18 seconds left in the four-period game, the Cougars scored the first goal giving them a 1-0 win against Loyola, closing out their last home game of the season.

Lily Schnieders, a junior forward on the women’s soccer team, has earned Ohio Valley Conference Offensive Player of the Week twice this season.

Women’s volleyball hosted a fundraiser to raise money for the Side-Out Foundation in honor of Dig Pink Weekend. While the team has participated in Dig Pink Weekend for years, the event has become personal. 

BRIEF: Esports hosts Super Smash Bracket: SLU, SIUC among other schools that participated 

Men’s Golf has received its first invite to the Bandon Dunes Championship in March of 2022. 

After an already successful “Let’s Play” of Rocket League, the Esports Club is excited to teach some of the other games they play competitively. 

SIUE women soccer played Austin Peay Governors for the Family Weekend Game and won 5-0.

Men and Women’s basketball are getting ready for the upcoming season, with both teams excited to get back on the court after a season disrupted by COVID-19.