Golf Mocs finish sixth in Autotrader tournament
With Oliver Simonsen shooting an 8-under-par 64, the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga men’s golf team moved up four spots to sixth in the final round Tuesday of the 12-team Autotrader Collegiate tournament at Berkeley Hills Country Club in Duluth, Georgia.
The Mocs’ aggregate 282 tied for the best round of the day and left them at 857, five shots behind James Madison and nine behind third-place Georgia State. Georgia Southern edged UNC Greensboro for the title 829 to 830.
Simonsen tied for 10th individually at 209, and teammate Will Porter was 30th at 216 with Etienne Brault at 218 and Leon Bader and Moritz Lammel at 219. Playing as an individual, Lake Johnson also shot 219.
Szczepanski honored
UTC junior Dani Szczepanski was chosen the Southern Conference volleyball offensive player of the week for her 26 kills on a .362 hitting percentage in nine sets last week. She leads the SoCon at .376 for the season.
This is her second player-of-theweek honor this season.
“I think the most impressive part is that even though she consistently sees two blockers from our opponents, she remains super-efficient and a big-time point producer for us,” coach Travis Filar said in a school release.
Softball starts Feb. 8
UTC recently announced its 2019 softball schedule, and it includes the Southern Conference tournament May 8-11, being held at Warner Park for the 11th time.
The Mocs’ season will begin with a Feb. 8-10 tournament at Kennesaw State with games against Ohio, Morehead State and Eastern Illinois as well as the hosts. Then come the Chattanooga Challenge and the Frost Classic the next two weekends at Warner Park, with the Mocs facing Tennessee Tech, Indiana State, Dayton, Kennesaw State, Creighton, Western Michigan, Ohio, Eastern Kentucky, Southern Illinois-Carbondale and Evansville.
UTC will be in Florida for tournaments March 1-3 at Madeira Beach and March 8-17 in Clearwater before opening conference play March 23-24 at Furman. UTC will host reigning SoCon champion UNC Greensboro the next weekend, and Western Carolina on April 19-20 and Samford on May 4-5 also will visit the Mocs in Jim Frost Stadium.
North Alabama is scheduled for a nonconference doubleheader at Frost on April 10.
“It looks like a challenging schedule for us in 2019, but we’re definitely up for that challenge,” UTC coach Frank Reed said in the announcement release. “We’re excited about the Southern Conference Championships being held in Chattanooga this year. There’s no better place than Frost Stadium to hold the championship.”