Southern Collegiate
Athletic Conference
Sports Release

Centre ● DePauw ● Hendrix ● Millsaps ● Oglethorpe
Rhodes ● Rose-Hulman ● Sewanee ● Southwestern ● Trinity

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 23, 2006
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 2006 Coaches-of-the-Year for men’s and women’s track and field and men’s and women’s golf.

DePauw University’s Kori Stoffregen was named the league’s men’s track and field Coach-of-the-Year. Stoffregen led the Tigers to their sixth SCAC men’s title in seven years at the 2006 Spring Sports Festival at Sewanee. Only Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, who won 11 consecutive championships from 1979 to 1989, has a better run of men’s track titles in league history. Stoffregen has been selected COTY each of those title-winning seasons to give him a combined nine men’s and women’s track & field COTY honors – the most of any former or current T&F coach in SCAC history.

Trinity University’s Jenny Breuer was selected as women’s track and field Coach-of-the-Year for the third time in four years. Behind 11 individual titles, Trinity’s women won their sixth championship in program history and third in the last four years at last month’s SCAC Spring Sports Festival. In total, Breuer has won four track & field Coach-of-the-Year honors – she was named SCAC men’s track & field Coach-of-the-Year in 2003. 

In golf, Jim Owen of Oglethorpe University was honored as men’s Coach-of-the-Year for the seventh straight year and eighth time in nine years. Only Robert Shankman of Rhodes, who was named men’s cross country COTY nine consecutive years from 1991 to 1999, has more consecutive COTY honors in SCAC history for any sport. The Petrels won their sixth SCAC men’s golf title at this year’s Spring Sports Festival and went on to post a program-best finish at the 2006 NCAA Division III men’s championships – finishing fourth out of 23 schools.

For the women, Vince Lazar of DePauw University guided his Tigers to the school’s fifth consecutive women’s golf title at the 2006 championships, and was selected as Coach-of-the-Year for his efforts – also for the fifth straight year. The Tigers finished third at the Division III Championships for the fourth straight year and this year's finish marked DePauw's fifth straight top-four finish in the seven-year history of the tournament. Only Methodist College has more top-three finishes. Lazar was also named NCAA Division III Region II Women's Golf Coach of the Year by the National Golf Coaches Association for the second consecutive year.

In announcements made earlier, Tim Scannell of Trinity was named the SCAC baseball Coach-of-the-Year and Roland Rodriguez, also of Trinity, was selected SCAC softball Coach-of-the-Year honors. In tennis, DePauw’s Scott Riggle was voted the league’s Women’s Coach-of-the-Year while Butch Newman of Trinity was voted Men’s COTY.

-SCAC-