Old Lyme's DeRoehn named Shoreline Player of the Year
Old Lyme's Emily DeRoehn, a senior defender, was named the Shoreline Conference Girls' Soccer Player of the Year on Tuesday.
Three coaches from Old Lyme were also honored by the conference. Boys' soccer coach Ally Gleason and volleyball coach Erin Crayton were both named coach of the year and Kendra Flaherty was named the boys' soccer sssistant coach of the year.
In girls' soccer, Ellie Zrenda and DeRoehn were first-team selections, Sam Gray, Alexis Fenton and Grace Lathrop made the second team and Stephanie Mauro, Abby Manthous and Lauren Wallace received honorable mention.
In boys' soccer, Mike Milazzo and Anders Silberberg made the first team, Avery Welch was a second-team pick and Tim O'Brien and Jesper Silberberg received honorable mention.
Melanie Warren and Abigail Sicuranza were second-team picks in volleyball and teammate Abby Speckhals received honorable mention. Aidan Powers made the boys' cross country team and Maddy Morgado and Alyssa Spooner made the girls' cross country team.
College honors
• Coast Guard Academy seenior Eugene Bizer and sophomores Jared Colletti and Finnegan Hall were placed on the D3Football.com National Team of the Week. This edition recognized players, by position, on all five teams that were able to play a contest in the fall 2020 season, resulting in just five games played in total due to the cancellation of a majority of the year due to COVID-19.
Colletti scored both of the Bears touchdowns, including one that cut the Coast Guard deficit to three points with 9:09 left in the game.
He took a little swing pass and made two defenders miss before taking off for a 24-yard touchdown catch-and-run. Colletti had six catches for 88 yards and a score and added four carries for 24 yards and a touchdown. He finished the day with 165 all purpose yards.
Bizer had a huge game to close out his career as he finished with a game and career-high 20 tackles, 14 solo and two for loss, one of which came at the end of the first quarter to help the Bears shut down a Mariners drive with the game tied 7-7.
Hall punted four times for the Bears, averaging 43.0 yards per punt. Two of them landed inside the 20 and another at the 23, and the Mariners managed a total of 1 yard in punt returns on the day.
Merchant Marine defeated Coast Guard 24-14 to capture the Secretaries' Cup in the only game of the season for both teams and the first game for Coast Guard head coach C.C. Grant.
• Four members of the UConn women's basketball team were named to the 50-player watch list for the 2021 Women's Jersey Mike's Naismith Trophy Watch List, as announced by the Atlanta Tipoff Club Tuesday.
Juniors Olivia Nelson- Ododa, Evina Westbrook and Christyn Williams and freshman Paige Bueckers were named to the watch list. UConn has the most representatives on the list, and Connecticut has won the most Naismith Trophies (10). Bueckers earned the 2020 Jersey Mike's Naismith High School Girls Trophy.
The midseason 30 team will be announced in early February; players who do not make the watch list are still eligible to be selected for the midseason 30 team. Then, the competition will be narrowed down to 10 national semifinalists on March 2, 2021, and four finalists will be named on March 19, 2021. The winner of the 2021 Jersey Mike's Naismith Trophy for Women's Player of the Year will be announced on April 3, 2021.
• Eight UConn teams posted perfect Graduation Success Rates (GSR) and a total of 15 squads performed at 90 percent or higher, as announced by the NCAA on Tuesday.
Teams that earned a GSR score of 100 percent included women's basketball, field hockey, women's ice hockey, women's lacrosse, women's tennis, men's hockey, men's soccer and men's tennis.
The GSR data shows the percentage of student-athletes earning a degree within six years of entering college. The NCAA developed the GSR to account for student-athletes not tracked by the federal graduation rate, which includes transfers into UConn and student- athletes who transferred from UConn in good academic standing. 2020 GSR numbers are based on entering classes from 2010 to 2013.
UConn had an overall GSR score of 92 percent, which eclipsed last year's mark of 90 percent and the 2018 GSR of 89 percent.
"Our student-athletes' performance in the classroom continues to be exceptional and is representative of their tremendous work ethic," director of athletics David Benedict said. "I would like to thank our SASP staff for their dedication to our student-athletes and our head coaches for fostering a culture that values academic achievement."