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Jeanne Reynolds — Scholar Athlete of the Year
Photo: Carlisle Stockton copyright 2000 |
A Table of Talent
Sports Banquet Honors Top Athletics
Ramapo's athletic department closed out the 1999-2000 season with its Annual Sports Banquet on May 21, honoring all sixteen teams as well as the top student athletes for the year. Senior men's soccer player Marco Chung (Harrison) was honored with the Robert Hartman Male Athlete of the Year award. Chung helped lead the team to a 14-3-2 overall record and was the NJAC leading scorer with seventeen goals and eight assists. He was named the conference Player of the Year, All Mid-Atlantic First Team and a NSCAA/Adidas Division III All-American, the first-ever Roadrunner men's soccer player to receive this honor.
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Marco Chung — Robert Hartman Male Athlete of the Year Award.
Photo: Carlisle Stockton copyright 2000 |
For the women, the duo of Tara Larkin (Mendham) and Rebecca Paul (West Orange) shared the Betty Logan Female Athlete of the Year award. Larkin, a forward on the women's basketball team helped lead the Roadrunners to a 15-11 overall record and their first ECAC Metro Region Tournament in five years. She was the team's leading scorer averaging sixteen points per game and 4.5 rebounds while shooting sixty-six percent from the free-throw line. Larkin was named to the NJAC All-Conference First team as well as the Met Basketball Writers All-Star Team. Paul stood as the department's only three-sport athlete as a member of the cross country, indoor and outdoor track and field teams. She was the team's highest scorer for cross country, leading the team in every meet, and running the fastest time by a Roadrunner since 1994 (20:27 Salisbury Invitational 9/25/99). Paul was also named to the WIAC First team for the second straight year. In the winter, she once again led all scorers indoors and was named to the NJAC Third team in the 500m and as a member of the distance medley relay team. In the spring, her tireless efforts helped lead the team to a 7th place finish at the NJAC Championship.
The top rookies were also honored as Stephanie Pillari (Westwood) and Ted Mussano (Wayne) were named the Most Outstanding Rookie Athletes. Pillari lit up the court as the top guard for the Roadrunner's
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Tara Larkin (left) and Rebecca Paul (right), co-winners of the Betty Logan Female Athlete of the Year Award
Photo: Carlisle Stockton copyright 2000 |
women's basketball team. She finished the season fourth on the team in scoring, averaging 11.2 points per game and 6.9 rebounds. Although Pillari suffered a season ending injury with three games remaining, she still ended the year as the team leader in assists with seventy-five and was second in steals with fifty-seven. Mussano stepped in as the "go-to-guy" in cross country and track and field. In the indoor arena, his relay team broke the school record in the 4x800m and they also shattered an eleven-year-old outdoor record in the same event.
Second year Head Coach Eugene Marshall, Jr. was honored as the Coach of the Year. It was his fine coaching along with an outstanding recruiting class that turned the Roadrunner women's basketball team from 7-17 in '98-'99 to 15-11 in '99-'00 and earned them an ECAC Metro Region Semifinal appearance.
Senior Jeanne Reynolds (Hackensack), the Roadrunner softball team's ace on the mound, was named Scholar Athlete of the Year, graduating with a 3.248 GPA as a nursing major.
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| Head Coach Eugene marshall, Jr. receives the Coach of the Year award from Michael Ricciardi, assistant director of athletics. |
The 1999-2000 athletic year proved to be one of the most successful in recent years, with the teams recording a 131-109-4 overall record, putting them over .500 (+24 games) for the first time since the 1995-1996 academic year. Several teams moved on to the post-season: men's soccer (ECAC Semifinal), and women's basketball (ECAC Semifinal) and men's basketball (ECAC First Round). Outdoor track and field crowned two NJAC Champions in James Attle (800m) and Melinda Diodonet (400m).
The overall success can be attributed to the hard work put forth by every athlete as well as the tireless recruiting, scouting, and work ethic of each coach on staff. Also adding to the overall success of the program were the spring sport teams which all finished over .500. Baseball had its best finish since 1990, completing the season with an 18-17 overall record while softball tallied a 21-16 record and qualified for the NJAC playoffs. Men's tennis also recorded one of its best records in recent years with an 8-4 mark.
After a very successful start to the millennium, the Roadrunners are back out on the fields and courts, continuing to win games and striving to climb to the top of the NJAC.
