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(02/09/18 2:50am)
Famed former baseball player, Mark Teixeira served as the guest speaker for Mercer baseball’s 10th annual First Base Classic event, an event that has seen speakers such as former Braves player and now Hall of Famer Chipper Jones, and Darryl Strawberry.
The event on Jan. 30 managed to draw out nearly 600 people, the largest crowd the event has seen. It started with an autograph signing session with Teixeira.
Local Macon resident John Kitchens has gone to the event for the past several years and says he has enjoyed it so far each time. He is friends with the Mercer baseball coaching staff and is a local pastor.
“It’s a great way to support them, but also I get a chance to meet some guys that I idolized as a kid,” Kitchens said.
He said being able to listen to a hometown hero—Teixeira played two seasons with the Atlanta Braves—was also a great showing up, and he just has a love for Mercer baseball.
The speaker, Teixeira, used the event to reminisce on his career and the lessons he learned not just from his professional career but from all the years of his life he spent playing baseball.
“For me, what I always tried to do was to play and live my life with no regrets,” Teixeira said.
Teixeira’s stats throughout his career reflect his mindset. Teixeira finished his career with 409 home runs, becoming the fifth switch hitter in MLB history to pass the 400 home run mark.
Teixeira touched on other subjects including his life post baseball, and handed down professional and life advice to the Mercer baseball players and baseball fans in attendance.
“This next season of my life is going to be very similar to my first one,” he said. “I’m going to start off at the bottom, I’m going to make a lot of mistakes, I’m going to learn from them, I’m going to meet a lot really cool people, and along the way I’m going to have some really cool stories, because 14 years from now hopefully I’ll have some great experiences and championships I’ll be able to talk about with the next generation of Mercer baseball players.”
(02/09/18 2:37am)
Mercer played their first home matches of the season Feb. 3 and 4 & 6 that ended in two unfortunate losses for the Bears but a win on Tuesday that sets their overall record at 2-2 and 1-2 at home.
The tournament last Friday started off well for the Bears, clenching the doubles competition with Mercer’s No. 1 and No. 2 pairings both winning their matches, securing the point for Mercer.
Things took a turn for the worst however during singles play.
The singles competition on Friday ended with only two wins for the Bears, Katie Sidor and Marie Mottet coming out over their respective opponents from Georgia Southern, Lindsay Truscott and Ella Monsey.
However the remaining four singles matches all ended in defeat for the Bears’ players, giving Georgia Southern a 4-3 victory for the day.
Saturday also ended with unfortunate losses for the Bears. The team fell 5-2 to the players from South Alabama.
Once again, only two of the Bears were able to take the win in their singles competitions, while South Alabama also managed to secure the doubles point winning 2-out-of-3 matches.
The team’s luck turned around on Tuesday when they faced off against the visiting team from Kennesaw.
The Bears took an early lead by sweeping the doubles competition for the first point and then continuing to win four singles matches to bring about a 5-2 victory at the end of the day.
No. 1 Katie Sidor took out her opponent in two straight sets 6-0 and 6-1.
The Bears are having another bout at home on Friday against Florida Gulf Coast University at 1 p.m.
(02/06/18 11:25pm)
Sam Philp was just named Southern Conference Men’s Tennis Player of the Week after Mercer’s wins against Georgia Southern and Alabama State Jan. 23 and 26.
The senior from Great Britain has been riding a wave of confidence ever since he became the first player in Mercer tennis history to be nationally ranked. Not only that, he is the only ranked player in the Southern Conference in both men’s and women’s.
[video credit="Jenna Eason" align="right"][/video]
“I think going into these matches knowing that I’m ranked gives me a lot of confidence and the perspective that I’m better than these players,” Philp said.
It may sound cocky, but it’s hard to argue when the numbers are on your side. In his first three years at Mercer, Philp accumulated a 40-32 singles record, after a 17-8 season his junior year.
“A few times I played some players who had been ranked throughout the year,” Philp said. “Unfortunately when I played them they had just gone out of the ranking. So I knew I definitely had the capability to perform at that level.”
His coach said he sees this kind of momentum should lend a helping hand in pushing the team forward in its spring season and beyond.
"This is another first for the program," Coach Eric Hayes said in a Mercer Athletics press release. "Sam is well deserving of this recognition as he had a great fall. This is a good way for us to go into our team match season and hopefully experience more firsts for the program."
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In Mercer’s tournament against Georgia Southern, Philp came out on top of Eagles player Stefano Di Aloy after winning the final two sets of his match. He and his doubles partner, Olivier Stuart also succeeded in their bout against Di Aloy and Diego Finkelstein.
For Philp, his final season is all about bringing home the SoCon championship title, a goal that Philp said has been too long in the making.
“We want to get that SoCon title, get that ring that we’ve been pushing for, especially these last 3 to 4 years,” he said.
His new level of confidence is pushing Philps to dream of playing on the professionally circuit after graduating from Mercer. He said that he wants to take a year off from school to focus on tennis and seeing about using his connections in both Canada and Britain to get him wildcard bids in professional tournaments.
“There are a lot of tournaments in Canada over the Summer,” Philp said. “There are definitely a lot of opportunities for me it’s all about making the best of those opportunities.”
At the same time, Philp wants to look for internships over the summer in case he decides to pursue his masters degree in biomedical engineering.
(02/02/18 11:20am)
Tosin Ogunyale, vice president of the newly formed women’s club basketball team, said she knew going into college that she would have to make some sacrifices to pursue her career, but she never wanted basketball to be one of them.
“I have been playing basketball for as long as I can remember and not playing on a team is a very different experience for me,” Ogunyale said. “Not having basketball be the center of my life anymore is different and I miss it, so the reason I want to start this club team is so I don’t have to let go of that part of me completely while Im finding a career here at mercer.”
She and fellow sophomore Tobi Woghiren, president of the club, decided they wanted to do more than just play intramurals, and after seeing the newly formed men’s club team develop, they would take it upon themselves to form a women’s team.
Coming to Mercer, Woghiren said she hoped to be a walk on for the Lady Bears, but never saw any sort of tryout information, so her plan didn’t work out.
Woghiren is similar to Ogunyale in that they both couldn’t imagine abandoning playing the sport they had spent so much of their lives dedicated to.
“I know it wasn’t an easy decision for me to stop playing,” Woghiren said. “We just wanted to give other people that opportunity to continue playing past high school just like we wanted to.”
The duo talked with Todd Thomas, director of wellness and recreational sports at Mercer, about forming a team and said he was very helpful in setting them on the right path.
Even though they are only in their first year, Woghiren said they have plans to travel to tournaments based on Thomas’ recommendations.
“[Thomas] said ‘there’s tournaments around the Georgia area, or it could be out of state just depending on our attendance,” Ogunyale said. “If we could travel, that would be great.”
After hosting a couple of informational meetings this and last semester, the two were able to put together a roster of seven players they said they hope will be a good foundation to grow the program from.
“Our biggest challenge has been adding players to the club,” Ogunyale said. “Even though, it is not as big of a commitment as playing for the school, we understand it is still a commitment nonetheless and that college students are very busy.”
Woghiren also said getting information about the team around campus has been the most difficult task in trying to organize the program. However, she said she has met other students around campus or through intramural who she believes would be interested in joining the team.
“If anyone is interested in joining the team don’t hesitate to contact us for more information,” Ogunyale said.
(11/20/17 3:45pm)
Going into this game, no one expected Mercer to upset the number one ranked team in the country; Alabama is number one for a reason. However, Mercer fans were disappointed to see their team not put up a single point against the SEC heavyweight.
Alabama made clean work of Mercer in all four quarters, ending the game 56-0 to move on to their next big game, the Iron Bowl against Auburn.
Head Coach Bobby Lamb said that Mercer failed to perform the way it needed to against such a strong team, and the results showed it.
“When you play the number one team in the country and you don’t execute the way you need to execute on offense and defense, you get exposed,” Lamb said. “I thought we started playing a little bit better the second quarter on defense, but there’s a reason Alabama is Alabama.”
There was one play in particular that may have done its job in breaking the Bears’ spirits. It was a 66-yard pass to Calvin Ridley that lead to a touchdown in the first ten seconds of the second quarter that was also Alabama’s third touchdown of the game.
Only two minutes later, Alabama scored its fourth touchdown when Josh Jacobs carried the ball into the end zone. By the end of the first half, the score was 35-0.
Alabama outperformed Mercer in nearly every aspect of the game. For the first half of the game, Alabama’s running backs broke through Mercer’s defensive line as if it were nothing. Mercer tried to adjust halt the yards, but then so did Alabama.
When Mercer started stopping runs, Alabama worked their deep options, and executed both short and deep passes with precision and speed that Mercer’s defense just couldn’t catch up with.
Alabama ended the game with 265 passing yards compared to only 54 from Mercer.
Linebacker Lee Bennett, who finished second in tackles in the game, said Auburn’s team is probably the closest Mercer has come to playing an offense as efficient as Alabama’s.
“We knew going in their offense wasn’t that complicated, it’s just that they can stay consistent throughout the game,” Bennett said. “That’s what separates them throughout every game that they play.”
Lamb said one of the most disappointing aspects of the game to be the three interceptions Alabama players made against Mercer quarterback Kaelan Riley. After the third interception in the third quarter, Riley was taken out and substituted with redshirt junior quarterback, Tanner Brumby.
“You’re getting your brains beat out, Kaelan is struggling a little bit, [Tanner] has gotten a lot of practice reps so we decided to go with him and let him take a shot at it,” Lamb said on the decision to substitute Riley. “We wanted to see if he could make some plays for us.”
Lamb and his players are taking this loss on the chin. He said that they hope to use this game as an opportunity to improve and hopefully grow their program.
(11/12/17 6:34pm)
Men’s tennis duo Nicolas Guillon and Ruben Vanoppen put on a performance at the 50th Southern Intercollegiate Tournament that would make you think they’ve spent hours of practice as a pair.
In reality, the exact opposite is true.
“We started to play doubles together at the conference tournament last semester,” Guillon said. “We didn’t practice, we just played the tournament together.”
Before each tournament, Coach Eric Hayes selects who he will pair up for the doubles tournament. Even without previous experience playing together, the two managed to put on a great performance and it was decided they would continue to be a pair this season as well.
It was for the best that they were left to play together. They rolled through the Southern Intercollegiate, even beating Georgia State in a third set tiebreaker.
“Our first two, three matches we kind of rolled through the opponents,” Vanoppen said. “On paper our first match was supposed to be the toughest. Playing a big school your first match is always nerve racking. It ended up they were more nervous than we were.”
Vanoppen said that to calm his nerves he reminds himself that every new point is a new opportunity, win or lose. Guillon said playing doubles with his partner helps him deal with the stress better than playing singles alone on the court.
Guillon specifically had much to be excited about with the tournament win.
“That was my first tournament that I won here,” Guillon said. “It was a pleasant surprise.”
Vanoppen said it was a great experience for him being able to play against so many good team’s in such a big tournament and take home the win.
“Me personally, I like to play doubles more than singles, so having a doubles victory is very nice,” Vanoppen said.
Vanoppen said their coach gives them just the right amount of pressure to prepare them for each tournament. It must be a mutual feeling amongst the team considering how well many of the players did at the most recent tournament hosted at Mercer.
(11/10/17 7:00pm)
Men’s Soccer
The Men’s soccer team overcame their first obstacle to a SoCon championship Saturday with a victory over Wofford College. They beat the Terriers at home 2-1. The final score does not reflect how dominant Mercer remained during the match, outshooting their opponent 8-1 in just the first half.
Neither team scored until the second half until Roberto Arteaga cracked open the goose egg with an assist from Jake Mezei. Will Bagrou followed up just 12 minutes later with another goal.
The two scorers accounted for 11 of the 19 strikes the team made during the match.
The Terriers attempted a comeback with a goal at the 69 minute mark, but the Bears held them for the rest of the match and took home the victory.
The Bears play their next finals match on Friday at 3:30 pm against East Tennessee State University.
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Women’s Soccer
The Women’s team’s season ended after an unfortunate 0-5 loss against Samford University, Oct. 28. The team finished regular season play with a 10-10-1 record.
Head coach, Tony Economopoulos, said he has to give Samford credit for playing a good match and is only looking forward to putting in more work for next season.
Overall, I was proud of the girls the whole season. We played a lot of freshmen and I felt at times we overachieved but we still have a lot of work to do,” Economopoulos said.
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Men’s Basketball
The Men’s basketball team played their first match against Troy University in a charity hurricane relief exhibition on Sunday. Proceeds from the match went to the Salvation Army.
The game ended 77-73 with a symbolic victory for Mercer. Both teams maintained a steady scoring pace throughout both halves with Mercer edging out their opponent by only a couple of baskets.
Ria'n Holland, Ethan Stair and Desmond Ringer led the team during the game, each of them scoring double digit figures.
Head Coach Bob Hoffman said it was great to secure this victory while at the same time being able to contribute to hurricane relief efforts.
“It's a real blessing for our program and university to be able to partner together on something like this. I'm thankful to Troy and Coach Cunningham that they chose to come over and be a part of this,” Hoffman said.
The first official home game of the season will be this Sunday at 2 pm.
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Women’s Basketball
The Women’s team will be playing their first home game Nov. 16 following two game on the road. Their game will commence at 7pm.
Men’s Tennis
The Men’s tennis team split up over the weekend to travel to Wake Forest University and Samford to play in two separate invitationals.
Mercer had a strong showing at Wake Forest, with Nicolas Guillon finishing 5th place in the A1 singles bracket.
The players won four of their sixth singles game on the final day of the tournament, but Coach Eric Hayes said he hopes to see even better performances moving forward.
“We left too many points out there today,” Hayes said. “We have to finish when we’re up. Overall I was very pleased with our performances this weekend. It was a good fall and we are looking forward to January and our trip to Florida State.”
(10/10/17 10:00am)
Men’s Soccer
The Men’s soccer team has been steadily working to improve their season. Since the last update they’ve improved their season to a 4-5-3 record.
They faced a close game against the University of North Carolina Greensboro Oct. 7. A goal by UNCG’s Thordur Johannesson ended the match in double overtime.
The team’s next game is Oct. 14 against Wofford at home.
Women’s Soccer
The women’s team also faced a loss against East Tennessee State University over the weekend putting their record at 9-6 overall. ETSU managed to score the winning goal in overtime.
ETSU’s win over Mercer puts them in a position of overtaking Mercer’s placing in the conference with Mercer with a 3-2 SoCon record and ETSU at 3-3.
This loss follows two wins against Western Carolina and Wofford, two other SoCon rivals that are placed 6th and 8th respectively.
Volleyball
Mercer’s Women’s volleyball team failed to secure two important wins over the weekend in away games against ETSU and Chattanooga. In both games the Bears dropped three straight sets, not being able to put up much resistance against fellow SoCon competitors.
The team plays again on Oct. 11 and 13 against Samford and Furman.
Cross Country
The Women’s and Men’s cross country team’s managed to place sixth and eighth respectively at the USC Upstate Invite Sept. 30.
The team’s will be at the Crimson Classic in Tuscaloosa, Alabama Friday Oct. 13.
Men’s Tennis
Three players on the Men’s team made it to the semi-finals of the Mercer-hosted Gridiron Classic including: Sam Phillips, Fernando Guardia and Nicolas Guillon.
Guardia beat Georgia Southern’s Artemie Amarie to make it to the finals. Unfortunately, the championship game was postponed to a later date that has yet to be determined due to inclement weather.
“Hosting an event like this is a lot of work but well worth it when we get to play the amount of matches we did,” said Coach Eric Hayes. “On the men's side it was a solid effort with Sam and Fernando making finals of their draws and several others making the semifinals.”
The men's team will play next in the ITA Regionals in Atlanta Oct. 13-17
Women’s Tennis
The women's team will play again when they travel to Athens to participate in the ITA Regionals Oct. 19-23.
(10/02/17 2:19pm)
The Mercer men’s soccer club team has only been around for as long as this year’s senior class, but the amount of growth they’ve seen in the past year puts them as possible contenders with schools like the University of Georgia.
The executive board of the team, President Juan Munoz, Vice President Myles Harris and Treasurer Paul Miletto, are the fortuitous captains responsible for this new redesign the team is undertaking.
Why “fortuitous”? That’s because their appointments to these roles were not by any planning.
The three players were sitting in class when they heard from a friend the women’s club team had already begun practice while the men’s team had not even voted yet on who their new captains were going to be since their old president had to abdicate his position to focus on his senior year.
Their old captain had tried getting people to apply to be part of the leadership so a vote could be placed, but no one had shown any interest for weeks.
“Everyone loves the team, granted,” Harris said. “But everyone just kind of wants to play.”
It was only after hearing that the Women’s team had started practicing that the three of them decided to take action.
“We put in the GroupMe, ‘We’re the president, vice president and secretary now’,” Harris said.
Nobody dissented, so the three of them inherited their leadership positions and have set on making the most of it, even taking the team to its first ever tournament.
“We’ve done round robins before. At Kennesaw last year we set up a round robin, but that’s like a one day thing,” the team’s president, Munoz said.
The team travelled to Auburn to play from Sept. 23 to Sept. 24. To their own surprise and the surprise of team’s they faced that weekend, they showed they could compete against the larger schools present.
“We had amazing results considering the size of our school versus the size of the schools we played,” Munoz said. “We played Alabama, and we tied them 1-1.”
In fact, the team only lost one game over the weekend.
Munoz said that for the first time, he is excited about the prospect of the team being able to play in the national tournament.
“Depending on how the season goes there’s this national tournament which is through NIRSA. They host a tournament for all the schools that finished first and second in their league,” he said.
If the season continues as it started, “like a bullet” as Munoz likes to describe it, then it’s not far fetched to believe there is a fair chance they can make it to the national tournament. They even managed to beat the Kennesaw team 5-1, who just in the past year had made similarly easy work of the Mercer team.
As far as the tournament goes, “It was the most amazing experience we’ve had with the club team as far as administrative roles for us,” Munoz said.
Miletto said he has found stepping into his role as treasurer to be challenging, but also rewarding. He said the team has to go through their financial director, Todd Thomas, to approve their purchases for any trips or equipment.
They don’t get a credit card or cash so they can’t spend their money independently, but Miletto said Thomas has made the experience much less stressful.
All three agreed that a huge part of the team’s success is from the influx of freshmen who came in dedicated to working hard and wanting to win.
“In past years, we haven’t had a huge interest in club soccer. We wouldn’t get the numbers we wanted at tryouts,” Harris said.
“All the freshmen have been a great addition, but two [that] stand out have been Heath and Hunter Henry. They’ve got the telepathic communication between them and they set up so many plays for us,” Munoz said.
Miletto said the team’s overall dynamic is great and that they do a good job of representing Mercer.
“We don’t bicker at each other. There’s never a time we’re yelling at each other. It’s always fun,” Miletto said.
In the end, for them and everyone who is involved with the team, the main goal is to have fun—though all three agreed that it’s much more fun to win.
(09/29/17 9:39pm)
It has been a rough first six weeks for many Mercer teams. While some have found steady success in the beginning of their seasons, others have not had as much to show for what looked to be a promising year.
Mercer football, volleyball, and men’s soccer find themselves in win to loss deficits, while men’s golf has had a shaky start in their first two tournaments. This trend cannot be attributed to a lack of talent in any of these teams.
Every one of these programs showed huge amounts of progress in previous years. Whatever the reason may be, it is still hardly mid-semester, so there is time for a much needed turnaround for Mercer sports.
Softball
The softball team came out strong in their fall season opener. They racked up four wins over the weekend against Georgia Highlands College, Wallace Community College-Dothan, East Georgia College and Georgia College & State.
Every single match was a blow out with Mercer outscoring their opponents by margins of 8-12 runs. In fairness, these teams are not regarded as major competitors.
The Bears will play their next match when they host Georgia Military College Oct. 7.
Men’s Soccer
The Bears managed to take home the win after an intense game against Georgia Southern Sept. 23. Forward, Will Bagrou, demonstrated why is SoCon male athlete of the year by scoring both of Mercer’s goals within the first 32 minutes of the game, while goalkeeper Jeremy Booth secured his 25th career win. Booth managed to secure four saves during this match.
This victory places Mercer’s record against Georgia Southern at 25-24. Mercer has managed to win seven of their last eight games against Georgia Southern.
This was an encouraging win that the team desperately needed, after having only won a single other game this season. The team’s record is 2-4-2 so far.
Women’s Soccer
The women’s team is tearing through their competitors. As of their last win against The Citadel, Friday, Sept. 22, the team has a 7-4 total record and a five game win streak. This was a great win for them to get, especially considering it being their first Southern Conference game.
Sophomore, Jasmine Spence, scored the first goal of the match in the 75th minute, and her first career goal. Her teammates, Rhette Caulian and Megan Delmonico quickly following up with two more goals to give the Bears a comfortable lead.
So far, the team has managed to consistently represent at home, winning five of their seven home games.
They will play next at home against Furman, Saturday Sept. 30.
Volleyball
It hasn’t been easy for the Women’s volleyball team so far this season. They have an overall record of 5-8 after a six game losing streak that just ended with their victory over The Citadel, Saturday, Sept. 23.
That hasn’t stopped individual players from putting on performances worth noting. In their win against The Citadel, Morgan Macgilvary and Paige Alsten managed to make 16 and 12 kills respectively.
Macgilvary and her teammate Emily Krogman both notched double-doubles with Macgilvary’s 16 kills and 11 digs and Krogman’s 11 kills and 12 digs. Krogman also scored three aces during the match.
The team’s next match will be away at the University of North Carolina Greensboro, Friday, Sept. 29.
Men’s Golf
So far the team has played in two tournaments: the Sam Hall Intercollegiate and the Inverness Intercollegiate. They placed 8th/12 and 10th/13 respectively.
Coach Kirk Kayden said, "We played very well for the first 27 of today's 36 holes. We were right there with many of the Power Five teams in this tournament's field. There's probably eight or nine NCAA Regional teams in this field. We hung with them, but didn't hold on over the last nine [holes].”
Freshman Tyler Copp stood out in the last tournament, managing to stay one-under-par with 141 shots, tying him for 15th place in the tournament.
The Men’s golf team will play their next intercollegiate in Kiawah, South Carolina, Oct. 22-24.
Women’s Golf
The Women’s golf team completed their first intercollegiate tournament Wednesday, Sept. 27. The Bears finished ninth out of 18 at the Golfweek Conference Challenge in Colorado.
According to a press release, the women’s golf team tied a program record for their lowest single-round score with a three-under par 285. Their next tournament is the Johnie Imes Invitations, which will start Oct. 2.
(08/30/17 10:11pm)
Men’s Soccer
The men’s soccer team fell in their first game to Georgia State 0-2 and their second match to the South Carolina Gamecocks 1-2.
On Sept.1, the team will be hosting the Big South/ Socon Challenge at Bear Field where they will play against teams like Gardner-Webb, Wofford and Winthrop.
Will Bagrou is the active career leader in the SoCon for points (63), goals (25) and game-winning goals while Jeremy Booth is currently the active career leader in the SoCon for wins (23), shutouts (14) and ranks second in career saves with 140.
Women’s Soccer
The women’s soccer team is hoping to recover from a shaky part of their season. In the Mercer Invitation, they played against Siena and Kennesaw State and fell to both teams 0-2. In their most recent match against Kennesaw, the team took 10 shots and 5 shots on goal, but they were unable to make anything fall into the net.
"It was another tough loss tonight, but I am very proud of how the team reached both games this past weekend when we were down at the half,” said Head Coach Tony Economopoulos in a Mercer Athletics press release. “We've just been a little bit unlucky in front of the goal but after 90 minutes on both Friday and Sunday, I felt we were the better side, we just couldn't put away our chances. We are young which has its learning curve but I feel that this team is progressing in the right direction and believe the future will be very good."
The team does however have a 2-2-0 record with two victories racked up in the beginning of the season against Troy and Montevallo.
The team will be travelling Sept. 1 to Milwaukee, Wisconsin for the Marquette Invitational. They will face Loyola Chicago University and Marquette University.
Women’s Volleyball
It’s been a couple of weeks of new adjustments for the Women’s Volleyball team. With a brand new coach, and a new roster of players to work with, the team is trying to find their rhythm in these first couple of matches.
The team went 1-2 in the Gamecock invitational in Columbia, South Carolina. They fell against South Carolina and North Florida, but managed to pull out a 3-1 set victory against Troy.
Emily Krogman and Paige Alsten both had impressive weekends, with Alsten managing to accumulate 34 kills in the team’s two Saturday matches.
"We had some very strong statistical individual showings this weekend but the best thing to come out of the weekend would be we started to see some desire to play ball in this system," said Head Coach Derek Schroeder in a press release. "We had some offensive success, and that fed the fire to want more. I think that means next week in practice we should see a lot of growth."
Cross Country
Both cross country team’s will open their seasons Sept. 1 at the Strut’s season opener at Jacksonville, Alabama.
Football
Mercer football kicks off their season Aug. 31 in their home season opener against Jacksonville. This will be the first opportunity for Mercer fans to see how this season’s roster handles the void left by the departure of a last year’s large senior class, including former Mercer quarterback John Russ who has been replaced by Kaelan Riley, a 6-foot-3, 222 pounds redshirt freshman.
Riley said he was prepared for this upcoming season knowing that Russ leaving would leave a vacancy. He described the assets he brings to the team that he thinks could help lead them to wins.
“I think I’m pretty tall and can see over the line maybe a little better than John could,” said Riley. “Otherwise, I’m pretty coachable. I do what my coaches tell me to do, and I learn pretty quickly.”
Head Coach Bobby Lamb said he believes that the new roster shows promise for a successful season.
“It’s very exciting. You lose 30 seniors who were here when the program started and got us off the ground and laid the foundation, but we have a great new cluster from the team last year,” Lamb said. Every year is different, but our coaches have done a great job recruiting and filling our needs. We’re deep in a lot of positions which we haven’t been in the past. That’s the thing that excites us. If we do have an injury, we can plug someone else in and be ready to go.”
(08/16/17 10:00am)
From 1978 to 2003, Barry Myers served as Mercer University’s head baseball coach. On Thursday, August 10, Myers passed away at the age of 78.
“Barry was a pioneer in the sport of college baseball,” said current Mercer head coach Craig Gibson in a press release. “I thought he did more with less than anyone I ever knew at a time when there were few resources to succeed.”
Gibson was a player at Mercer in the 1980s while Myers was head coach.
Before he was promoted to head coach, Myers was an assistant at Mercer from 1974 to 1978.
During his years coaching at Mercer, Gibson racked up 663 wins. According to a press release from Mercer Athletics, Gibson won the most games as coach in the team’s 146 year history.
During Myers’ tenure at Mercer, the team won three Trans America Atlantic Conference titles. He was named Trans America Atlantic Conference coach of the year four times.
At one point, the team managed to have 9 consecutive seasons where they won 30+ games.
As well as ensuring great athletic success for his program, Myers made sure his players also performed in the classroom. In his 26 year span at Mercer, more than 95 percent of his players earned their college degrees.
13 of Myers’ players were selected in the MLB draft during his coaching career at Mercer, including Mike Mimbs who played for the Philadelphia Phillies from 1995 to 1997.
“He put our program in position to have the success we have today. He’s a mentor and a friend, as well as a role model for young people. You can’t say enough about Barry,” Gibson said.
Myers was inducted into the Mercer Athletic Hall of Fame in 2002.
(08/16/17 10:00am)
After a team leading 2017 season that included eight goals and 20 points, Will Bagrou is now on the watchlist for the MAC Hermann trophy, a prestigious award annually given to the top NCAA division one men’s soccer player.
Brad Ruzzo, Mercer Mens’ Soccer head coach, said in a press release, “This is a great achievement for Will as well as our program.”
The award is voted on by a panel of judges from the United Soccer Coaches association. The voting doesn’t take place until the end of the season, but if Bagrou performs similarly to how he did last year, then he has a good chance of winning the award.
Last season, Bagrou was a semi-finalist for the award, but his other accomplishment of being SoCon Male Athlete of the Year may help him stand out this year.
Bagrou is the first Mercer student athlete to win the award and also the only men’s soccer player in SoCon history to have ever won it.
Bagrou said the honor of being the first men’s soccer player to win the award resonated with him considering all of the other notable soccer players who have passed through the conference.
“If you go along the lines of great soccer players who have played in SoCon, such as Clint Dempsey, who is one of the best players on the U.S. Men’s National Team, for me to be the first one is a huge honor.”
Ruzzo said Bagrou’s performance put him in a special position to win the award that historically has been dominated by football and basketball players.
“It’s special for him,” Ruzzo said. “He had a very special season last year, and I know he’s got a lot more in his game to be even better in his senior year.”
Bagrou is keenly aware of where this award puts him in terms of former SoCon Male Athlete of the Year recipients.
“Looking at the list there are a lot of great athletes,” Bagrou said. “Steph Curry, Adrian Peterson and Jerry West — they’ve all won this award.”
Ruzzo said that he fully expects Bagrou to play professionally in the future and is proud of the role Bagrou has played during his time at Mercer.
“He’s a leader. He’s been through the wars with us and he’s played every minute and started every game since he’s been here,” Ruzzo said. “He had 8 or 9 goals last year, but he could have had 13 or 14 goals. He really has a great future if he has a really great season.”
Even with these high expectations from his coach and the other coaches who will be judging him this season for the MAC Hermann award, Bagrou has managed to narrow his center of attention on only what remains in front of him: his team and the next game to come.
“If we make a run in the NCAA tournament, then me and a bunch of other guys will get lots of recognition,” Bagrou said. “So first and foremost we’ve got to focus on the team, and the individual awards will come.”
However, as many athletes do, Bagrou has set a high bar for him to reach this year in terms of scoring goals.
“Every year I try to get to double digits. 15 is a good aim, but I need to take it game by game,” Bagrou said. “[I’m] looking forward to game one which is Georgia State, and we’ll take it from there.”
Mercer’s regular season begins Aug. 25 playing at Georgia State.
(04/27/17 2:50pm)
For those unfamiliar with the pool game Battleship, it’s similar to the board game counterpart with one main objective: sink the enemy’s ships. Mercer intramurals has hosted the game at Plunkett pool for several years now and it continues to grow popular.
The game consists of four canoes with a maximum of four people in each canoe who are trying to sink the other three canoes using pails to haul water into the enemy boat. The last boat floating is the winner.
Michael Castaneda, the assistant director of recreational sports and wellness, said students are known to use all sorts of props like buckets or even plastic trash cans from their rooms — anything that can collect water.
Castaneda said Mercer Rec Sports uses this game to welcome students back in the Fall semester and to send students off at the end of Spring semester.
The game, like other intramural sports at Mercer, is played tournament-style with teams competing to take the number one spot.
“We usually get a great turnout,” Castaneda said. “There’s usually about 16 to 20 teams. Most teams sign up on IMLeagues, which is our scheduling system, but we do have people that may just be hanging out at the pool and see us setting up that will sign up to participate. ”
Pool Battleship is a young game that’s popular on college campuses around the country. Castaneda said the concept of the game was only created six or seven years ago. In the three years that he has been at Mercer, intramurals has hosted the game every year.
“I think it’s a fun sport for students to get involved with their friends or if it’s in the beginning of the school year to meet new friends,” Castaneda said. “It’s a fun way to enjoy a unique water sport you don’t see as often.”
With the way the weather is during this time of year, Castaneda said it makes sense to put on a sport that gets students into the pool.
Issa Ford, the student director of officials in Mercer Rec Sports, said he’s played Battleship on a couple of occasions and has enjoyed it every time.
“It’s a fun, entertaining game that has no skill level,” Ford said.
Ford said the most fun part about the game is watching the enemy’s boat sink after an incredibly competitive match.
Battleship marks the last intramural event of the school year. There will be a tournament on April 28. Students who are interested can sign up until Friday at 3:30 p.m.
(04/27/17 2:25pm)
The Mercer University Orchestra will have their final performance of the year April 28. The group will be performing Antonio Vivaldi’s “The Four Seasons” and “Divertimento for Strings” by Curtis Bryant.
Amy Moretti, Director of the McDuffie Center for Strings, said in an email, “The Vivaldi 'Four Seasons' is such a famous work in the classical repertoire. We thought it would be wonderful to feature each of the violin students as soloists in a movement from this piece that depicts the seasons in such a vivid way.”
“The Four Seasons” is a work of four violin concerti that was premiered in 1721.
Moretti said when you hear the piece it is as if “you hear the birds chirping in Spring and the bugs and oppressive heat of Summer.”
Moretti said she believed it was important to play music by living composers which is why they chose “Divertimento for Strings” by Bryant as their second piece. The composer Curtis Bryant will be in attendance at the concert.
The concert will be conducted by Ward Stare. Stare is a highly recognized conductor who has been described by the St. Louis Post Dispatch as “one of the hottest young conductors in America.”
As well as conducting at Mercer, Stare has conducted pieces for the Atlanta Symphony, Houston Symphony, Québec Symphony, Dallas Symphony, Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra and St. Louis Symphony.
Stare has been responsible for leading the group’s rehearsals in the weeks leading up to the concert.
The concert begins at 7:30 p.m. on April 28 in Fickling Hall.
(04/18/17 12:57am)
The Kickball Team, as their name suggests, is an intramural team comprised of various Mercer athletes that pulled off a playoff victory on April 6.
Nicola Tirpak captained the team and Justin Connelly, a senior Mercer golfer on The Kickball Team helped bring together the athletes. He said this team was formed with getting a championship t-shirt in mind.
Connelly said this isn’t the first time he’s played on a team like this; however, this is the first time that his team has been able to clinch the title.
“We’ve had a similar team to this the past couple of years and have been beaten in the finals,” Connelly said.
Connelly helped form the team by bringing in his contacts from golf, some soccer players, and other athletes from miscellaneous sports around Mercer.
“I knew just about everyone on our team,” Connelly said.
One of those who Connelly recruited for the team was his teammate on the golf team, Kiko Rosete, a sophomore from Spain who was asked to play because of his previous soccer experience.
“I used to play soccer so it was easier for me,” Rosete said. “We had a bunch of other athletes on our team as well including other soccer players.”
The team went 4-2 in the regular season; however, when playoffs came around they settled into a rhythm that pushed them toward the championship.
Many of these games were not won easily. Against Fresh Kicks of Bel Air they won 1-0 and against Phi Delt 3-2. To contribute to the rigor of making it to the championship was the tight schedule in which they were forced to operate.
Three of the games during the playoffs were all played on the same day due to inclement weather conditions the week before. Tirpak said that by the end of the day they were all exhausted but still determined to win the whole thing.
The Kickball Team won the championship game 8-3, but Connelly said at the beginning it looked like they were going to have a difficult time.
“We were down 2 to 0 after the end of the second inning,” Connelly said.
However, they managed to fight back in the third and take a lead that would only grow from there.
Many of The Kickball Team veterans are graduating, leaving only a few behind to carry on the team’s tradition. It is likely though that competitive intramural players will repeat this experiment in the future of bringing together a diverse set of athletic Mercer players.
(04/16/17 12:10am)
Hannah Keller, a sophomore and history major at Mercer, was honored Saturday, April 1 at the Phi Alpha Theta Honor Society conference with an award for her paper, “Inside the Mind of a King: Using Marriage to Break an Alliance”.
Every year, Phi Alpha Theta Honor Society sponsors its Georgia Regional Conference. This year, Mercer University hosted the event.
College students from around the state visited to deliver lectures on their research on subjects ranging from imperialism to gender and sexuality.
“I’m very excited,” Keller said. “This [was] my first conference, but I love history, and I love sharing it with people. To know that my work was worthy of an award is really gratifying. It lets me know that I’m in the right field.”
Several other students from universities around the state, including LaGrange College, Georgia Southwestern University and Georgia College & State University, had their research honored by the society.
The activities lasted from 9 a.m. that day until 3:30 p.m., with a lunch intermission that included a presentation from guest speaker Maurice J. Hobson, a professor at Georgia State University who presented his research titled “Using Hip Hop as History: From the Black New South to the Dirty South”.
Hopson talked about how his personal life helped shape the way he does his history and demonstrated how it’s possible to use non-traditional sources like hip-hop to study how Atlanta politics developed from the 1970s to the 1990s.
Abby Dowling, a history professor at Mercer, said the purpose of this conference is to help students with a passion in history, whether it is their major or not, get helpful critique on their research.
Dowling said in order to receive an award at the conference, students’ projects had to display good use of historical research techniques.
“The judges primarily were looking for historical promise,” Dowling said. “What that translates to is, ‘are they able to do the research, are they looking for primary sources through the library, and that they’ve done additional secondary research.’”
Dowling said that those who won awards were truly deserving based on the standards that the society had set.
“In the case of all of our winners, they were all demonstrating excellent historical promise and creative interpretation of sources and historical situations,” Dowling said.
(04/11/17 5:28pm)
Mercer’s Student Government Association elections have brought the topic of diversity back into discussion, so I feel it is important to talk about this ambiguous word.
I have had the recent experience of being able to attend a community forum hosted by Mercer’s Center for Collaborative Journalism that explored why Macon-Bibb County schools are becoming resegregated.
During one of these forums, a Macon resident made an important point as to what diversity actually means and why it is important. She said that minority students often need to be in school with white students in order to get the resources that they need for better learning.
I grew up in a county that was filled with both predominantly black and predominantly white schools, so it was a moment of clarity for me to reflect and see how disproportionately funding seemed to be allocated between the two.
This point struck a chord with me, because people talk about diversity all the time, but never do justice of explaining why diversity is a necessity. For some people it may not be, but for many it is ever so crucial.
We can’t deny that we live in a country that often affords opportunities to certain members based solely on the color of their skin or economic background; there are around 400 years of history to disprove anyone who would even think of arguing against that.
Accepting that is the first step to understanding why diversity means so much to so many people and why there are so many SGA candidates running on this platform.
[sidebar title="2017 SGA Senator Candidates" align="right" background="on" border="none" shadow="off"]
For more information, check out the elections site.
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The word diversity has been thrown around by SGA Senatorial and Presidential candidates alike.
In my personal opinion, these claims get thrown around so much that they hardly even seem to have substance anymore.
What do you think about when you hear the word diversity? Is it the image one of those promotional university pamphlets that has multi-ethnic students laughing together while also studying in a park?
If that is the image you get, then you should ask yourself if that is what diversity really means or if there is something more to the subject than just having a plethora of varied skin tones?
The point is that championing for diversity does nothing if you’re not aware of what makes diversity so important or what it even looks like.
So instead of arguing for more diversity, I would like to move beyond just that and see more talk of why diversity is such an important theme in the first place.
In America, minorities have a difficult time succeeding unless they have an understanding of white culture and society, but the cultures of other Americans are often successfully ignored or even trivialized until it is incorporated into the mainstream culture (take how cornrows were considered ghetto until Kendall Jenner wore them or how popular henna tattoos have become recently).
In the same way that minority students need white students in their schools in order to get proper resources for learning, minorities don’t always have an equal voice or representation unless they have white counterparts who share the same message as them.
To me, diversity is important because it allows for the sharing of thoughts and ideas among everyone, so that everyone’s voice can receive the respectable amount of attention they deserve.
People come from different backgrounds and have different needs; it is not always race based even though most of the time this dialogue comes up it is centered around race. Many people come from different socioeconomic backgrounds as well, that others have not experienced and affect what their needs may be.
If you plan on voting for an SGA ticket that promises diversity on its platform, it is important to not to just vote for diversity because it has a positive connotation and it sounds good.
Be sure to understand the real implications of what diversity would mean for you and for other Mercerians.
You can vote for SGA here.
(03/28/17 1:07pm)
The Mercer chapter of Zeta Phi Beta had their annual Zeta week from Mar. 19 to 25 with a series of events meant to promote their theme for this year, “Black Girl Magic."
Sydney Simpson, the social chair and marketing coordinator for the Omega Mu chapter of Zeta Phi Beta, said the events were part of the sorority’s finer womanhood week that was hosted by different chapters throughout the nation.
“Black girl magic is about black women coming together and celebrating each other, everything we do as black women and the many roles that we have,” Simpson said. “Black girl magic is also the strength that black women have. It’s a complex idea.”
Simpson said the week is all about inspiration and being able to bond with others.
The sorority kicked off their week Sunday with a church service and inspirational movie and ended the week with a finer womanhood 5k hosted by Zeta Phi Beta’s graduate chapter and a cookout at their house on greek row.
On Monday they hosted an event on natural beauty. Zelda Hill, who works in Career Services at Mercer and also works with Mary Kay on the side, shared tips on how to take care of skin and natural hair.
Other events hosted during the week included an empowerment panel featuring guest speakers from the Macon community and Mercer who talked about how education plays a role in empowering black women and how to uplift each other in the community.
Thursday the sorority hosted a talent show titled Black Excellence Exhibit. The show featured an African drummer, singers, poets and even displayed the fashion line of one of the sorority members.
Autiana Brooks, the sitting president of the Omega Mu chapter of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, echoed a similar sentiment about what the theme of this year’s finer womanhood week means to her.
“[Black girl magic] for me is embracing the distinctness of what it means to be an African American woman and loving yourself and who you are,” Brooks said.
(03/28/17 12:48pm)
Traffick Jam has been working for several months on a campaign to raise money to fund courses in local Macon high schools to teach about sex trafficking prevention and awareness.
The organization has raised $2200 dollars at this point in the semester and hopes the donor drive will push them even further in their campaigning.
Will Davis, a member of the events team who is partly responsible for organizing the donor drive, said funding to subsidize the classes would come to around $5 per student.
“We’re trying to cover the costs of potential students and also get them to start their own Traffick Jam organizations within their schools and hopefully have it spread,” Davis said.
The efforts of their fundraising will culminate Mar. 28 at the Mercer versus Georgia Tech baseball game where they will hosting several fundraising events. The festivities start at 5 and the game begins at 6.
The first of these events is a corn hole tournament with a $100 grand prize for the contest winners. Tickets for the tournament will be sold at the stadium or can be bought in advance from a member of Traffick Jam.
The second event is a raffle for a baseball autographed by former Mercer baseball player and current professional player in the Seattle Mariners organization, Kyle Lewis.
Traffick Jam representatives will be present at the game and will make several announcements throughout the event about the organization and their cause.
“We want to make our presence known to as many people as possible,” Davis said.
The organization is working hard to boost attendance at the game in any way possible. They have even talked to the Mercer Maniacs about getting them involved in advertising the game.
Lindsey Sherrod, a project manager for Traffick Jam, said the donor drive has been an imperative part of the organization’s operations.
“It has not only funded our resources to teach high schoolers and market the organization, but it has given us the opportunity to raise money for the incoming Traffick Jam team to continue the legacy that we hope to leave in the community,” Sherrod said in an email.