Happy Monday Daily Stampeders! This will be the first of our Weekend Roundup, where we'll run through what happened over the weekend in the world of USF Athletics.
Also, quick introduction of myself. My name is Nick Simon, I am a USF football writer for
Underdog Dynasty and now a contributor to this site. Having graduated from the school in 2014, I've sat through my fair share of
dumpster fires throughout my green and gold career, so I'm more than ecstatic to see things finally back on the up and up with most of our programs. Let's get to all of this past weekend's action.
AAC Tennis Championships
There have been three American Athletic Conference Tournaments in Men's Tennis, and #17 USF has taken home all three. After cruising by East Carolina and Tulane on Friday and Saturday, coach Matt Hill's team sealed the three-peat on Sunday with a 4-0 victory over #2 seed Tulsa to claim their 18th conference title in program history.
The AAC Champs were led by senior Roberto Cid (The Kid) who notched the honor of being named tournament MVP with a weekend record of 2-0 in singles (one of those coming over #2 singles player Dominik Koepfer of Tulane) and 2-1 doubles.
"It's crazy, I didn't expect any of this when I came to college, it's a great feeling knowing that since my freshman year we've been able to do well in conference play," said Cid when speaking to the school's website afterword. "It's a huge accomplishment and hopefully these guys continue to keep it up next year."
Up Next: NCAA Tournament, which begins on May 13th. The Bulls made it to the Sweet 16 last season before being knocked out by Baylor.
Meanwhile, the exact opposite fate awaited the USF Women's team (17-7) as they fell to their Tulsa counterparts 4-0 in the finals.
While coming up just short of the conference championship and an NCAA Tourney bid, first-year coach Cristina Moros should be applauded for the work she did in her first season, taking a squad that just won four matches in 2015 to the brink of an AAC title . It's yet another spring program where the future looks bright.
Lee Ann Spivey... Boss
In the midst of #21 USF Softball's (42-11, 14-1) weekend sweep at Tulsa (apparently USF vs Tulsa was the common theme of the weekend), senior Lee Ann Spivey stamped her name into the USF record books by becoming the all-time home run leader in school history.
The 2015 All-AAC first teamer belted her record 37th career homer in the second inning of Sunday's 5-2 victory against the Golden Hurricane. As of today, she leads the conference in home runs (13) and slugging percentage (.704) as you can bet she's on her way to yet another first-team all-conference selection.
Make that 34 out of 36 since March 5th for Ken Eriksen's ballclub whose team has been a borderline unstoppable force of destruction since their rocky 8-9 start.
Next Up: The final weekend home series of the season vs. UCF beginning on Friday. Senior Day will be on Saturday April 30th while Sunday's contest will be broadcast at 5 p.m. on ESPNU.
Baseball Loses Series At Houston
USF Baseball's (19-21) up and down season continued, losing their series at Houston over the weekend.
Sandwiched between a 5-1 loss on Friday and a 7-5 defeat on Sunday was a brilliant performance by junior Brandon Lawson, who supplemented a Luke Borders three-run home run with a seven-inning, one-run outing to improve his record to 4-3.
The 2016 season has been riddled with injuries and inconsistency, but that's perfectly fine given the circumstances as the future looks bright with the talent Mark Kingston is bringing to Tampa.
Next Up: After hosting a quick game vs. FIU on Tuesday, the Bulls look to get out of the cellar of the American when they host rival UCF for a three-game series this weekend. All games will broadcast on 1040 AM.
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