Dear Friends of Tribe Athletics,

We are fortunate to have so many former student-athletes who return to their alma mater to share their life lessons. Interestingly, our baseball team heard an outstanding talk from a basketball alumnus earlier this week. 

Curtis Pride '90, pictured below, was a CAA All-Rookie Team selection in 1987 and was named to the CAA All-Defensive Team in 1988 and 1989. After college, he turned his attention to baseball and became the first full-season deaf player in the modern baseball era, playing 11 seasons in Major League Baseball.
 
Curtis spoke to the team about his unique and fantastic career and gifted them with copies of his book,"I Felt the Cheers: The Remarkable Silent Life of Curtis Pride." He also spoke with the W&M American Sign
Language Club.

Curtis' journey has been full of challenges, but his indomitable spirit carried him to an accomplished and full life. Thank you, Curtis, for sharing your story with us. 

Notable

• The Tribe has four USA Gymnastics Collegiate All Americans!  Kudos to Connor Barrow, vault champion (pictured below); Sam Lee, vault; Ricky Pizem, high bar; and Luke Tully, all-around & high bar!

• The 12th-ranked Men's Gymnastics team will compete at the 2025 NCAA Championships hosted by the University of Michigan on April 18-19.  Follow them on ESPN+.
• Armon Wright, pictured below, was named the conference's Men's Co-Field Athlete of the Week after he was the event winner in the triple jump at the 59th annual Colonial Relays this past weekend, where Track & Field finished third out of 25 teams in both men's and women's action. Armon is a two-sport athlete for the Tribe, as he is also a wide receiver on the football team.

• At the Colonial Relays, Molly Weithman, Kelly Ann Sutterfield, Arianna DeBoer and Catherine Garrison won the 4x1600m.  Teammates Kianne Benjamin, Avery Glidden, Leah Gould and Emily Ervin took home the gold in the 4x400m.
• A strong showing from Camden Goldknopf paced the Men's Golf team to a sixth-place finish, out of 14, at the Testudo Cup.
• Swimming has eight College Sports Communicators Academic All-District honorees!  Congratulations to Aiden Bond, Jasha Heide, Colin Mamaril, Brock Rempe, Devin Genderson, Sophia Heilen, Erin Langenburg and Flynn Truskett!
• Paige Gilbert, pictured below, of Lacrosse eclipsed 100 career points and continues her ascent in the Tribe's career record books!

• Baseball's Ben Parker and Arianna DeBoer of Track & Field were named CAA Institutional Scholar-Athletes of the Year.
• Hayes Trapp medaled in two events at the CAA Indoor Track & Field Championships and was named Men's Indoor Track & Field Rookie of the Year.
• After hitting .500 over four games last week, Baseball's senior outfielder Christian Rush, pictured below, was named the CAA Co-Player of the Week.

• Previously, infielder Jamie Laskofski was the CAA Co-Rookie of the Week. He had a walk-off hit as the Tribe swept Hofstra, and over the three-game series, he batted .462.
• The Tribe had an impressive showing in the Dan Stimson Memorial Invitational, with the T&F athletes winning a slew of medals, on the strength of 25 event wins!

Called to the Hall

I recently had the pleasure of contacting seven incredibly accomplished former student-athletes and two equally impressive former coaches to let them know they had been selected for our Athletics Hall of Fame. 

Now, I am equally delighted to share with you the nine individuals who make up our Hall of Fame Class of 2025.

• Grace Golden, Women's Lacrosse, 2011         
• Steve Isaacs, Men's Golf, 1970         
• Sarah Jonson, Women's Lacrosse, 2011
• John Lowenhaupt, Men's Basketball, 1978                
• Erin McGonegal Entlich, Women's Soccer, 1993
• John Sauer, Dir. of Speed, Strength and Conditioning, 1988-2018
• Tony Shaver, Men's Basketball, Head Coach, 2003-2019
• Elaina Balouris Tabb, Women's XC/T&F, 2014
• B.W. Webb, Football, 2013

The Class of 2025 will be inducted at the formal ceremony on Friday, September 19, and celebrated during the Tribe's home football game against Charleston Southern the following day. More details will be forthcoming.

While on the topic of the Hall of Fame, time is quickly running out for your chance to be a part of history. The deadline for purchasing your ticket to the May 10 induction event for our three iconic head coaches, John Daly (Women's Soccer), Cliff Gauthier (Men's Gymnastics), and Jimmye Laycock (Football), is April 25th, so act soon!

It Takes A Village
An army of people works behind the scenes every day to make W&M Athletics a special place. One of those individuals is Laura Amato, our director of creative content for 20-plus social media accounts across multiple platforms. Her good work can be found on all of our sports social media accounts, as well as on the main @TribeAthletics account on Instagram and X. Last month, she was profiled in the CSC Women to Watch Series, a truly deserving honor. The group is part of College Sports Communicators, and in my opinion, they couldn't have chosen a better person to highlight!  Take a look.

We Can't Get Enough!
If you are still walking on air after the phenomenal way our Women's Basketball Team roared through the CAA Tournament and became the first Tribe basketball team to participate in March Madness, here's another opportunity to celebrate the team and coaches. They will be honored at what is sure to be a memorable end-of-year Banquet on April 27 at Kaplan Arena.  You can register here. Don't worry if you can't make the banquet there will be additional opportunities to honor this amazing group including a banner-raising and a ring ceremony this fall!

A Tribe Like No Other
After the wonderful celebrations around women's basketball, I had time to catch up on some terrific Tribe Scribe articles.  The NFL Draft is right around the corner, and we have a great article about senior left tackle Charles Grant and how he bucked the transfer portal trend to stay at W&M. We can't wait to see what team is fortunate enough to draft him!
 
You may not know her name, but if you've been to a Tribe football game, you've probably seen Melanie Bowling entertaining the crowd with her fantastic twirling. Her story and that of Zoe Doughty , former goalkeeper for the Tribe and now keeper for AS Monaco FF in the French Football Federation (and the only non-French speaking woman on the team), offer great insights into the importance of sport for these women.

Fun Fact
It's very cool to realize that W&M has four former football players/coaches in the ranks of NFL coaches.  Sean McDermott, head coach of the Buffalo Bills; Mike Tomlin, head coach of the Pittsburg Steelers; Brian Daboll, head coach of the New York Giants and Dan Quinn, head coach of the Washington Commanders, and make up this stellar quartet.

OTOD Update
Before I leave you to enjoy what I hope is a great weekend, I wanted to thank everyone who participated in One Tribe One Day. This university tradition brings together alumni and friends from all over the world to celebrate and support our great school. Early returns suggest it was an excellent day for Tribe Athletics.  Once we have all the results, we will share them with you.
 
Go, Tribe!

Brian D. Mann
Director of Athletics