2008 Woodie Awards
Record breaking athletes set standard
By Adam Brewer
Rocket Sports Editor
Issue date: 12/2/05 Section: Sports
People say that in sports, it's all about the team and not about the individual. People say that in sports, it's about winning championships, and not breaking individual records.
That may be true most of the time, but sometimes great individual achievements deserve to be recognized.
At Slippery Rock University, there have been so many records broken or tied in sports, from football to swimming, over the past five years. It seems that every sport has a record being broken by one special individual.
Let's start with football and the record-breaking season senior running back Josh Kniess had this season. Kniess is currently the all-time leader in both all-purpose yards, with 5,148 yards, and rushing attempts, with 775 carries, in his career. Kniess also ranks in the top 10 in career scoring, career touchdowns and career rushing yards at the university.
From the field to the hardwood, the player one thinks of when mentioning the women's basketball team is point guard Amber McFeely. A senior captain for the 2005 season, she broke the all-time assists record at SRU earlier in the season. McFeely, arguably one of the best point guards in Rock history, is currently averaging seven assists per game this season.
In Rock baseball last year, Chase Rowe, who graduated in the spring, had one of the best offensive seasons in Rock baseball history. Rowe had a batting average of .414 with seven homeruns, 29 RBI's and a .696 slugging percentage.
Cross country got a big lift this season from the addition of freshman Jeff Weiss. Weiss was named as NCAA Division II East Regional men's Athlete of the Year by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.
Weiss had an outstanding and record-breaking season in his first year at the Rock with achieving a third place finish in the Division II national championships and winning both the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference and Eastern Region titles. Weiss was the first Rock cross country All-American since 1993 and his third place finish is the highest achieved by a Rock cross country runner since 1983.
That may be true most of the time, but sometimes great individual achievements deserve to be recognized.
At Slippery Rock University, there have been so many records broken or tied in sports, from football to swimming, over the past five years. It seems that every sport has a record being broken by one special individual.
Let's start with football and the record-breaking season senior running back Josh Kniess had this season. Kniess is currently the all-time leader in both all-purpose yards, with 5,148 yards, and rushing attempts, with 775 carries, in his career. Kniess also ranks in the top 10 in career scoring, career touchdowns and career rushing yards at the university.
From the field to the hardwood, the player one thinks of when mentioning the women's basketball team is point guard Amber McFeely. A senior captain for the 2005 season, she broke the all-time assists record at SRU earlier in the season. McFeely, arguably one of the best point guards in Rock history, is currently averaging seven assists per game this season.
In Rock baseball last year, Chase Rowe, who graduated in the spring, had one of the best offensive seasons in Rock baseball history. Rowe had a batting average of .414 with seven homeruns, 29 RBI's and a .696 slugging percentage.
Cross country got a big lift this season from the addition of freshman Jeff Weiss. Weiss was named as NCAA Division II East Regional men's Athlete of the Year by the U.S. Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.
Weiss had an outstanding and record-breaking season in his first year at the Rock with achieving a third place finish in the Division II national championships and winning both the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference and Eastern Region titles. Weiss was the first Rock cross country All-American since 1993 and his third place finish is the highest achieved by a Rock cross country runner since 1983.
