Rutgers Olympic sports wrapping up long, frustrating fall season

Men’s Soccer (1-13-2, 0-6-2 B1G)

It took two months and three days. That is a long stretch waiting for a win. But the Knights finally broke through on Saturday, winning on the road at Bradley, 3-2. In the process, GK Dave Greczek became the all-time saves leader for Rutgers. Greczek closed out the night with seven saves, his third save pushing him ahead of Joe DeMorat (1984-87) to the top of Rutgers' all-time saves leaders list. He has 368 career stops in his four-year career "On the Banks".

Junior Jason Wright had two goals and an assist and sophomore Thomas Dovell put in the game-winner for his first career goal.

Head coach Dan Donigan could finally smile after a game this season and he offered his support for his team. "These guys have been through so much adversity this season, but they fought hard, never gave up, and gave their very best to get this result tonight," said Donigan. "They have been put up against a lot between an incredibly tough schedule and the amount of injuries the roster has taken, but they never once bailed and battled to the very end to get this win."

The Knights will face Michigan in the play-in game of the Big Ten Tournament on Saturday at 1:00 pm. RU and Michigan played to a 1-1 tie on Oct. 7 in Piscataway.

Joel Miller, ‘63, ‘64

Rutgers Athletics mourns the passing of Joel Miller, an alum and prominent supporter of the Scarlet Knights, who passed away last week. Miller and his family were instrumental in building the Miller Family Soccer Complex, home to the training grounds for the Rutgers men's and women's soccer programs.

A graduate of Rutgers College (`63) and the Rutgers Business School (`64), Miller followed his time "On the Banks" as a partner at Arthur Anderson, CFO of LF Rothschild and later owned his own brokerage firm, MTR Securities.

Miller's son, Mike (RC `91), was a member of the Scarlet Knight men's soccer team that went to two Final Fours, including the national championship game as a senior in 1990.

Women’s Swimming

It was a grueling weekend for the Swim team as they competed in a quad and a tri-meet in the Midwest.

in the quad meet at Notre Dame, Junior Addison Walkowiak captured the 1-meter diving title as RU finished 1-2 in the 1-meter dive. Walkowiak secured the 1-meter title with a score of 293.45, while senior Alyssa Black placed second with a mark of 289.45. Black also finished second in the 3-meter dive with a score of 308.50.

In team action, the Scarlet Knights fell to the Hurricanes (165-132), Fighting Irish (221-78) and Boilermakers (197-102).

“We definitely showed a lot of heart and drive today as a team,” said head coach Petra Martin. “People were stepping up and we saw a lot of very good things in our races and dives. The team is working really well under very tough conditions, and our skin is getting tougher. I'm proud of the women and I’m looking forward to more toughness tomorrow.”

And tomorrow saw the Knights in Evanston for a tri-meet Northwestern and Illinois. RU fell to both the Fighting Illini (168-132) and the Wildcats (187-113), while producing five event titles.

The Knights started the meet strong wwith a first-place result in the 400 medley relay. Sophomore Vera Koprivova, senior Rachel Stoddard, sophomore Francesca Stoppa and freshman Alexandra Fabugais-Inaba combined for a top mark of 3:47.03 to win the event.

Stoppa also hit the wall first in the 100 butterfly with a time of 56.11. Koprivova collected the other first-place time in the pool for Rutgers with 2:00.89 finish in the 200 backstroke.

In diving, junior Addison Walkowiak collected her second 1-meter diving title in as many tries, recording a 300.55 to win the event, while senior Alyssa Black placed right behind in second with a score of 295.25.

Women’s Volleyball (4-21, 0-12)

Two conference road contests, two tough losses for volleyball.

Going on the road to face No. 3 Minnesota, the Knights dropped the match, 3-0. Rutgers was led by senior right side Lauren Cloyd with eight kills. Freshman middle blocker Jasmine Stackhouse added in six kills and a team-best four blocks.

It was much of the same in Madison as No. 4 Wisconsin topped RU, 3-0. Meme Fletcher led the team with eight kills, while adding in 10 digs and two blocks. Mikaela Matthews and Lauren Cloyd led the squad with eight blocks apiece as RU led UW in total team blocks, 14-2. Jasmine Stackhouse added in six blocks of her own, her most in a Big Ten match and one shy of her career-best.

Field Hockey (9-8, 3-6 B1G)

A loss to the top team in the conference isn’t necessarily the worst thing in the world. The Knights finished the regular season with a 4-2 loss to No. 3 Maryland on College Park. RU will turn around and face the Terps in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament on Thursday at 3:00 pm. That game will be on BTN.

Against Maryland, Rutgers got goals from senior Rachel Yaney and freshman Nikki Santore.

“I thought we played a good first half,” head coach Meredith Civico explained. “We moved the ball well, we were threatening on the attack, disciplined on defending and in the execution of the game plan. The start of the second half, Maryland caught us off guard on the opening play and we got a little flat after that. But the team fought hard. We’re going to take a lot from this game and we’ll start preparations for Thursday’s game against them to open the Big Ten Tournament.”

Women’s Rowing

RU competed in two events over the weekend, the Head of the Schuylkill in Philly and Princeton Chase on Lake Carnegie in Princeton.

The Head of the Schuykill results were not available and were not reported by Rutgers on its website. Scarletknights.com also did not have the Princeton results. In that regatta, though, the Rutgers A boat finished 41st of 59 boats while the Rutgers B boat finished 54th.

Big Ten Cross Country Championships

Women

The women finished 14th of 14 teams at the B1G championships.

Alexandra Juzwiak was the Scarlet Knights’ top runner finishing the 6K course in 23:37.9, placing 95th in the meet.

Michigan won the 2016 Big Ten title with 63 points, followed by Penn State in second with 70 points and Michigan State in third with 80 points.

Men

The men finished in 11th place of 12 teams, ahead of Iowa.

Sophomore Conor Murphy placed 58th overall as the top Scarlet runner. Wisconsin captured the team title with a score of 63, followed by Michigan State with a score of 66. Indiana finished third with a score of 92.

Men’s Golf

The men are competing in the 2016 Kiawah Classic in Kiawah, S.C. The meet continues through Tuesaday.

Women’s Golf

are competing in the Idle Invitational in Macon, Ga. The meet continues through Tuesday.