Southern Collegiate
Athletic Conference
Sports Release

Austin ● Centre ● Colorado College ● DePauw ● Hendrix ● Millsaps
Oglethorpe ● Rhodes ● Sewanee ● Southwestern ● Trinity

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 31, 2007
Contact:  Dwayne Hanberry, SCAC Associate Commissioner

SCAC NAMES COACHES-OF-THE-YEAR FOR SPRING SPORTS

SUWANEE, Ga. - After exclusive voting by head coaches of each sport, the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference (SCAC) announced its 2007 Coaches-of-the-Year for men’s and women’s track and field and men’s and women’s golf.

Trinity University’s Jenny Breuer was selected as both the men’s and women’s track and field Coach-of-the-Year after leading her Tigers to both team titles at the conference championship meet last month. This is the fourth time in the last five years that Breuer has been named the league’s women’s track and field Coach-of-the-Year. She is the first coach in the SCAC era to win the award four times. It is Breuer’s second men’s track and field COTY honor. Two weeks ago, Breuer was named the South Region women’s track and field Coach of the Year by the United States Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association.

In golf, Bill Cochran of Rhodes College was honored as men’s Coach-of-the-Year after leading his Lynx to their second conference title in program history and first since 2004. Rhodes went on to post a program-best finish at the 2007 NCAA Division III men’s championships – finishing sixth out of 35 schools. It is Cochran’s first men’s golf COTY honor – snapping a streak of seven straight wins of the award by Oglethorpe University’s Jim Owen.

Like Cochran, Dan Ruyle of Southwestern University guided his squad to a conference title and was rewarded with his first-ever SCAC women’s Coach-of-the-Year honor. The championship was the first for the Pirates since the program won back-to-back women’s golfing titles in 1998 and 1999. Southwestern went on to post a fourth place finish at the 2007 Division III championships – the highest finish for the program in three appearances. Ruyle’s award snaps a five-year stranglehold on the honor by DePauw University’s Vince Lazar.

In announcements made earlier, Carl Iwasaki of Austin College was named the SCAC baseball Coach-of-the-Year and Wendie Austin-Robinson of Centre College and Bonnie Skrenta of DePauw shared SCAC softball Coach-of-the-Year honors. In tennis, University of the South’s Conchie Shackelford was voted the league’s Women’s Coach-of-the-Year while Tom Cath of DePauw was voted Men’s COTY.

-SCAC-