Andre Roberson is named PAC-12 defensive player of the year
Mar 11th
The standout from San Antonio, Texas, is CU’s first-ever defensive player of the year award recipient. Roberson was also named one of 10 players to the conference first team, in addition to being named one of the five players to the all-defensive team.
It’s the second year the conference coaches have named Roberson a first-team and all-defensive team selection.
Roberson (6’7”, 210-pound, San Antonio, Texas/Wagner HS) was a force on defense for CU this season, as the Buffs limited their opponents to a Pac-12 low 62.2 points per game in league play. He led the conference with 11.5 rebounds and 2.3 steals per game, while also contributing 1.4 blocked shots per game (8th in the Pac-12). His 1,019 career rebounds are second all-time at Colorado.
Roberson leads the nation in rebounding and ranks among the top-25 in steals per game. Also on the national level, he has recorded 10 rebounds, two blocks and two steals in 10 games this year, twice as many as any other Division I player. He’s the first CU player to average a double-double (10.8 ppg., 11.5 rpg.) in back-to-back years since Shaun Vandiver (1989-91).
Dinwiddie (6’6”, 190-pound, Woodland Hills, Calif./Taft HS) earned first-team honors for the first time in his collegiate career after leading the Buffs in scoring with a 15.4 points per game average (7th in Pac-12). His conference scoring per game (16 ppg.) ranks sixth, and he is fifth in free throw percentage (82.2) and 11th in assists (3.0).
He leads the Buffs with seven 20-point scoring games (four of those in the Pac-12), tops CU in assists (91, 3.0 apg.) and at the free throw line (82.2%). He has led the team in scoring 13 times. The conference honor is Dinwiddie’s second straight after bring named to the second team as a freshman.
Roberson and Dinwiddie are the first CU pair named to the conference first team since 1968-69 when Cliff Meely and Gordon Tope were named to the Big 8 Conference first team. In fact, Ken Charlton and Jim Davis (1962-63), and Charlton and Wilky Gilmore (1961-62) were the other tandems in the same year named conference first team.
Scott (6’10”, 215-pound, Monument, Colo./Lewis-Palmer HS) is CU’s second selection to the all-Pac-12 freshmen team in as many years (Dinwiddie). His initial season as a Buff has been a successful one; he ranked second in team field goal percentage (48.7), free throw percentage (75.3), and rebounding (5.4).
Scott has started 27 of 28 games in which he has played. He is also fourth in scoring (10.7 ppg) with 16 games in double figures and a pair of double-doubles.
The other major conference awards were as follows: California junior guard Allen Crabbe – Pac-12 Men’s Basketball Player of the Year; Arizona State guard Jahii Carson and UCLA guard Shabazz Muhammad – Pac-12 Co-Freshman of the Year; Stanford junior forward Dwight Powell – Pac-12 Most Improved Player of the Year; and Dana Altman of Oregon –John Wooden Coach of the Year.
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An epic victory for Buff women’s tennis
Mar 11th
The last time the Buffs beat a conference opponent in the regular season was on April 11, 2010, when they defeated Kansas on their home turf. After 26 matches, the Buffs have finally ended the streak.
CU redeems itself after a 7-0 loss to Arizona in Tucson last season. The Buffs have now won three of the teams’ last four matches. Colorado improves to 6-6 overall, 1-1 Pac-12. After defeating three ranked teams this season, including then-ranked No. 41 Minnesota, Arizona slips to 8-7, 0-2.
“It feels really, really great,” CU head coach Nicole Kenneally said. “The players have done a terrific job overall, and they really deserve this win. I think it’s a great day. One through six singles and one through three doubles had great efforts. It’s the Pac-12, the best women’s tennis conference in the country, with more national titles than any other conference. It’s one of those things where you really have to come to compete to win matches. Today we came to compete. This team, as I’ve said after previous matches, continues to improve and get better every match. Today was an example of that improvement. We’ve come a long way since the first match this year. I’m excited for the girls. They worked hard and they deserve it.”
For the seventh time this season, the Buffs jumped out to an early lead after claiming the doubles point. Julyette Steur and Erin Sanders got the ball rolling with an 8-4 victory over Smyth/Stubbe for their sixth win of the season. Winde Janssens and Carla Manzi Tenorio continue to lead the Buffs with dynamic performances in the No. 2 doubles position. The tandem has fallen just twice this season, raking in their ninth win after edging Austin/Hendrikx 9-8 (4).
Winde Janssens has been pushed to three sets in her last three matches, and for the second time in as many matches, she came from behind to claim a victory. As she did on Friday against No. 111 Desirae Krawczyk of Arizona State, Janssens dropped her first set, won the second 6-0 and clinched the win in the third. Janssens handed Kim Stubbe just her fourth loss of the season. After falling 2-6 in the first set, Janssens won eight straight games in the final two sets, pulling away 6-4 in the final set. Janssens earns her 13th win of the season (losing just twice this spring), and her team-high seventh come-from-behind win.
Carla Manzi Tenorio also earned her 13th win of the season, and 39th of her career, with a 6-1, 6-2 victory over Shayne Austin. All but two of Manzi Tenorio’s victories this season have been in straight sets.
Erin Sanders proved she wants her final season as the Buff to be a memorable one, clinching her team’s first ever Pac-12 win with a three set victory over Akilah James.
“I think it’s really exciting, just because it’s the Pac-12, we haven’t had a Pac-12 win yet,” Sanders said after her match. “You want to go out with a bang and remember your last season, so it was quite a relief.”
Sanders was down 2-3 in the first set when she surged back to win 6-3. Sanders lost a second set battle 3-6, but jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the third. James responded with a three game run of her own to tie things up, but Sanders refused to lose, claiming the win 6-4 in the final set.
“I think for me and everybody else, it kind of just shows that we have lots of opportunities and we’re here in the Pac-12, and it doesn’t matter what the number is in front of the team we’re playing, we have a shot,” Sanders said. “We did it today and we can do it in our next match.”
The Buffs hit the road for a five-match trip, where they’ll take on four Pac-12 rivals and their final non-conference opponent. The trip begins with a visit to Los Angeles as the Buffs take on USC at 2:30 p.m. (MDT) on Friday, March 15 and UCLA at 2 p.m. (MDT) on Saturday, March 16.
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CU men’s golf team wins championship
Mar 11th
The University of Colorado men’s golf team turned in one of its finest performances of the year in winning the Bandon Dunes Championship here Sunday.
The Buffaloes had four players finish in the top 17 in recording a 2-under par 862 team score, the only one in the 17-team field that was under par as CU posted two of its best single round scores this season the last two days to earn the win. Colorado spent the entire tournament in either first or second, and was never out of the lead the final 30 holes.
The Buffs, ranked No. 79 this week, defeated eight teams ranked ahead of them in going from worst to first in consecutive tournaments for the first time in program history; two weeks ago, CU was 15th out of as many teams in The Prestige at PGA West. That accomplishment topped the 1998-98 team, which opened the spring with a 17th place finish out of 18 teams in the PING-Arizona Intercollegiate but bounced back to win the Southwest Classic its next time out.
It was Colorado’s second major tournament win of the season, as the Buffs won the Air Force Falcon Invitational last September, and also enabled CU to climb back over the .500 mark against Division I teams, improving to 58-52. CU’s last spring tournament victories came in 2008, with wins in both the Louisiana Classics and the Ohio State Kepler Intercollegiate.
Fresno State zoomed into second place, but still finished five shots behind the Buffaloes (867) despite playing the last six holes at 11-under par. No. 3 Washington also turned in a 9-under par final round but couldn’t catch CU in taking third with an 873 score. Rounding out the top five were No. 49 Oregon (874) and No. 14 SMU (882).
It was CU’s first win over a Top 5 team since 2004, when it won the Western Intercollegiate over No. 4 Georgia Tech, and its first against a team ranked third or higher since the 1994 NCAA Central Regional, when the Buffaloes finished second, one spot ahead of No. 1 Oklahoma State.
“The credit really goes to the guys, they did a phenomenal job,” Colorado head coach Roy Edwards said. “Even though we finished where we did in Palm Springs, we played better (than in the spring opener at Hawai’i), we just had too many big numbers. From that standpoint, I definitely saw improvement. The guys were motivated to come out and compete this week and prove that they’re a good team and we definitely did that.”
This is just the fourth time in program history that the Buffaloes have won two major tournaments in the same season, and the first time they have one at least one in both the fall and spring seasons. Three of the four times have happened under Edwards, who is in his seventh year as head coach.
“I know the guys have been working on being more consistent, being generally smarter than they had been with their play,” Edwards said. “We were never too high or too low, the guys were calm this morning and they expected to do well, despite the last couple of tournaments.”
How consistent was CU this weekend? For the 15 rounds combined (270 holes), the five Buffaloes combined for only five double bogeys, zero in the last 179 holes, and no scores worse; they had 50 birdies and 53 bogeys in playing a season-best 79 percent of the holes at par or better.
Senior Jason Burstyn paced the Buffaloes for the seventh time in nine tournaments this season, closing with a second 1-under 71 on the 6,859-yard, par-72 Old Macdonald Course, giving him a 2-under 214 which tied for third, four strokes out of the lead. He flirted with medalist honors early after birdying two of his first five holes and went on to post his third top five finish this season, his fourth in the top 10.
Burstyn completed the tournament with 10 birdies and 37 pars against just six bogeys and a double. He lowered his team-leading stroke average to 71.9, as added to his bests of 15 rounds of par or better, including 12 subpar rounds.
“I felt like I made some pretty good par putts to keep my momentum going,” Burstyn said. “I had a few three putts, but I made a lot of lag putts from 50 feet or so. These greens are tough, big and have a lot of undulation. I have a new driver and I was able to keep it low, under the wind, and that’s been helping as well.”
He had some help for really just the second time this year, as CU had a season-best four players that counted toward the team score in the top 20, and matched best with three at par or better.
“It’s always great to see your teammates play well, and that definitely takes a little pressure off,” Burstyn said. “I still want to do my best no matter what, but it still makes things a little easier. I am proud of everybody.
“We still didn’t even get to practice that much for this tournament,” he added about preparing for Bandon Dunes. “We’ve seemed to be indoors forever. It’s almost like we play better when the conditions are worse. Even two years ago, our first time out here, we played pretty well. The warmer climate teams aren’t used to this, even though the last two days here weren’t bad at all, at least to us.”
Sophomore David Oraee got off to a hot start Sunday, birdying his first three holes (Nos. 2-4) en route to carding a 2-under 70, CU’s best score in the final round. That gave him a 1-under 215 overall, tying him for sixth place, his second best finish of the year. He had four birdies, 12 pars and two bogeys, giving him 11 birdies and 34 pars on the weekend, against just eight total bogeys and a double.
Freshman Philip Juel-Berg also posted his second best finish of the year, fashioning a 1-under 71 Sunday for an even-par 216 total, tying him for ninth place. He opened with a bogey, but after scoring a par reeled off three quick birdies in succession before playing the last 13 holes at 1-over; he had a team-best 12 birdies in the tourney and was the only Buff not score worse than a bogey.
Senior Derek Fribbs carded a 2-over 74, which gave him a 2-over 218, tying him for 17th. He had one of CU’s two low rounds of the tournament (a second round 70), wrapping things up Sunday with three birdies, 10 pars and five bogeys; he had 11 birdies and 31 pars on the weekend. He had one bad patch in the final round (bogeys on Nos. 9-10-11), otherwise would have also been under par for the meet.
Redshirt freshman Drew Trujillo closed strong, as he was playing in his first tournament where his scores counted toward the CU team total. His first two here did not, but his final round 1-over 73 did, as he cruised around with two birdies, 13 pars and just three bogeys to finish with a 15-over 231 total, tying him for 73rd. He birdied his first hole for the second straight day, and would have turned in an even-par effort had he not bogeyed his last hole (No. 2).
Fresno State’s Troix Tonkham claimed medalist honors, as he closed with a 69 for a 6-under 210 total, good for a three-shot win over teammate Rufie Fessler.
“This certainly is a confidence builder,” Edwards said. “I think everyone was frustrated because we knew we were a good team but we just weren’t showing it. It also shows the resolve of the team because it proved that they could come out and beat a lot of high quality teams. All we did was to just put things together a little bit better. College golf nowadays is so competitive, if that you are a little off, you will get beat and sometimes beat badly.”
This was the seventh tournament win under Edwards, snapping a tie with the late Les Fowler for the second-most in a coaches’ reign at CU; the late Mark Simpson’s teams won 16. Both coached at the school for 29 seasons.
The Buffaloes return to action in two weeks, when they will travel to California during CU’s spring break to participate in the Cal-Irvine Anteater Invitational (March 25-26) and the Stanford U.S. Intercollegiate (March 28-30).
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