The landscape of athletics will change on the NIC campus with the approv-al by the NIC Board of Trustees to

transition from the NJCAA to the Northwest Athletic Association of Community Col-leges (NWAACC) over a two year period. The move was strongly influenced due to financial reasons affecting the college bud-get. With the decision, the outdoor sports of fastpitch softball, men and women’s soc-cer and men and women’s golf will begin competing in the NWAACC in Fall 2014. The indoor sports of volleyball, men’s bas-ketball and women’s basketball will remain in the NJCAA for two more seasons. Wres-tling will remain in the NJCAA since the NWAACC does not offer wrestling as a con-ference sport.

Over the past ten years NIC enjoyed un-precedented growth, but consistent with national trends, enrollment has begun to decline. Last semester NIC’s enrollment declined 10% and this semester has contin-ued with an 11% decline. In planning for the fiscal year 2015 budget it was projected that enrollment will continue to decline by up to another 10%. With a commensurate decline in tuition revenues, the reduction in FY 2015’s budget will be approximately $2.3 million for NIC. Based on the finan-cial budget reductions affecting all depart-ments on campus, the athletics program was faced with a decision of cutting programs or switching conferences. With a vision for long term program and jobs sustainability, the decision to opt for the less costly finan-cial model to join the NWAACC was rec-ommended. Increased NJCAA conference

Booster Club NewsN O R T H I D A H O C O L L E G E

LUNCHEON SCHEDULE: 4/29: Noon: Coeur d’Alene Resort • 5/13: Noon: Outback Steakhouse

APRIL/MAY 2014

NIC Joins NWAACCBasketball, Volleyball get two more seasons in NJCAA

INSIDE: WRESTLING FINISHES SIXTH IN THE NATION AT TOURNAMENT

travel costs, national championship tourna-ment travel, and NIC’s reduction in tuition grants awarded to the athletics department made this decision essential.

The NWAACC voted unanimously to in-vite NIC to join over a two year transition period, but it was contingent on all programs making the switch. In the NJCAA, NIC’s closest conference rival was the College of Southern Idaho (515 miles away) and as far away as the College of Southern Ne-vada, near Las Vegas (1,120 miles). In the

NWAACC, travel partner Community Col-leges of Spokane is only 35 miles away and most region members are within a 2-4 hour drive. Local conference rivals and region championships in nearby areas should con-tribute to more fan support and the ability to attend championship events.

With the move NIC will forego national championships opportunities with the excep-tion of Wrestling, but will gain affiliation in a 34 member conference. The NWAACC is

- See NWAACC, Page 3 -

MALE ACADEMIC NOMINEES Basketball- Bryce Leavitt Wrestling- Kyle Godhino Golf- Chris Cremer Soccer- Adam Garman

FEMALE ATHLETE OF THE YEAR Basketball- Renae Mokrzycki Soccer- Kellsi Parson Golf- Jennie Williams Volleyball- Russia Robinson Softball- Marissa Tarin

MALE ATHLETE OF THE YEAR Basketball- Bryce Leavitt Wrestling- VJ Giulio Soccer- Christian Botuli Golf- Angus Montgomery

Tickets are $30. Please reserve your seat with the Athletics Department at (208) 769-3348. Din-ner choices include a choice of salmon or chicken so reserve your selection in advance. Plan on an exciting evening revisiting the memories that make NIC an exceptional college!

BOARD OFFICERS

PRESIDENT Jon Parson

VICE PRESIDENTRoger Stewart

TREASURERMark Hampe

SECRETARYGinni Lenz / Patty Stewart

BOARD MEMBERS

Robert CliffPatty StewartSteve CaseyTom Messina

Julie StarkFrank Darlington

Mike O’BrienJon Berger

John MarchesoA.D, Al Williams

(aawilliams@nic.edu)

PHOTOGRAPHSDon Sausser

CONTACTPatty: 208-769-3348

P.O. Box 492Coeur d’Alene, ID 83816patty_stewart@nic.edu

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The North Idaho College Booster Club is a nonprofit organization, committed to providing financial support to all recognized intercol-legiate athletic programs at NIC through various fund-raising and en-dowment activities for student ath-lete grant-in-aid and team benefits. Organized in the 1960s, the Booster

Club supports all NIC recognized in-tercollegiate athletics as a lifelong learning experience that will enhance the value of sportsmanship and pro-vide a positive experience for stu-dent athletes, students, and fans. The club also recognizes the commit-ment our athletes make to the young people of our community through our

athletic Cardinal Kids outreach pro-grams. The Booster Club holds vari-ous fund-raising events throughout the year including an annual auction, awards banquet, 3-on-3 basketball tournament, and golf tournament. It also sponsors a booth each year at the North Idaho Fair and operates a con-cession stand at all home events.

M I S S I O N S T A T E M E N T

AL WILLIAMS

It’s been a few months since we had a newslet-ter come out, and as you can imagine much has happened this semester. In addition to the

conference realignment to the NWAACC (see page 1), we hosted the 2014 NJCAA National Wrestling Championships. Special thanks to the Spokane Sports Commission and our tournament commit-tee for making this a memorable tournament for all 42 schools represented, and over 250 wrestlers. Congratulations to NIC Wrestling for a 6th Place National finish. Kudos to our tournament Direc-tor Craig Hanson for an outstanding job. The next tournament host privileges were awarded to Coun-cil Bluffs, Iowa as the NJCAA decided to return to a three year cycle in one location for the future Wrestling Championships. Des Moines will host next year in the last year of the current bid cycle.

Congratulations to the winners of the Athletics Department faculty and staff awards, voted on by the coaches and student-athletes. The Squirt Keat-ing Faculty Award went to Physical Education In-structor Ryan Hayes. The Floyd Rosenlund Staff Award went to Adam Mortensen of the Mainte-nance staff. In addition over 90 students earned a GPA of 3.0 or better for the semester to earn Aca-demic Honor Roll recognition. Congrats to all of our honorees.

NIC ATHLETICS DEPARTMENT AWARDS BANQUETJoin us for the Annual Athletics Department

Awards banquet. Team MVPs, Scholar Athletes and Booster Club Member of the Year will be rec-ognized on May 3rd at the NIC Edminister Student Union Building. This year’s nominees include:

FEMALE ACADEMIC NOMINEES Softball- Kylene Hatton Soccer- Alex Rodriguez Golf- Maddie Hauck Volleyball- Allison Meehan Basketball- Jansen Butler Cheer- Raquel Halverson

Tradition of Excellence

PAGE 3

DATE EVENT TIME

Apr. 25 Softball vs College of Southern Idaho (Game 1) 1 p.m.

Softball vs College of Southern Idaho (Game 2) 3 p.m.

Apr. 26 Softball vs College of Southern Idaho (Game 1) 12 p.m.

Softball vs College of Southern Idaho (Game 2) 2 p.m.

Apr. 27 Women’s Soccer vs University of Montana 11 a.m.

DATE EVENT TIME

May 2 Softball vs Colorado Northwestern (Game 1) 1 p.m.

Softball vs Colorado Northwestern (Game 2) 3 p.m.

May 3 Women’s Soccer ALUMNI GAME 1 p.m.

Softball vs Colorado Northwestern (Game 1) 12 p.m.

Softball vs Colorado Northwestern (Game 2) 2 p.m.

N I C C A R D I N A L S H O M E E V E N T S C H E D U L E

NWAACC- Continued from Page 1 -

comprised of community colleges in Wash-ington and Oregon and Douglas College in Vancouver, British Columbia. They do not participate in national competition in the post season after their regional championships. NIC will become a member of the Eastern Region of the NWAACC with the Commu-nity Colleges of Spokane, Walla Walla CC, Columbia Basin College, Big Bend CC, Ya-

kima Valley College, Blue Mountain College, Treasure Valley CC, and Wenatchee Valley College. In addition the NWAACC has ath-letic scholarship limits that are lower than the level that NIC currently awards under the NJCAA. The NWAACC allows their member colleges to recruit student athletes in Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, California, Alaska, Hawaii and the province of British Columbia, Canada. Recruitment of athletes in these neighboring states still allows the op-portunity for diversity in team rosters.

NIC student athletes and teams will still

be able to earn individual and academic All-American accolades and national rankings through the various National Coaches Associ-ations. Also, affiliation in the NWAACC may allow the ability to return former eliminated sports like baseball and cross country back to the campus.

Most important, in addition to being fis-cally responsible, NIC will be able to pre-serve athletic and gender equity opportunities for all of the current nine intercollegiate pro-grams, plus the cheer team, without eliminat-ing jobs for coaching staff or athletic trainers.

SAVE THE DATESThe annual Coeur d’Alene Crossing, the

2.4 mile swimming event will change dates from Sunday to Saturday. Come join us on August 16 at the Coeur d’Alene Resort golf course starting point. Go to www.cdacross-ing.com for more details.

Scott Hague Memorial Golf Tourna-

ment will be held on Friday, June 6 at Avon-dale Golf Club.

Register online or call the NIC Athlet-ics Department at 208 769-3348. 1:00pm Shotgun Start. $100 per player or $375 for a team, includes golf, cart, dinner by Outback Steakhouse and an NIC Shirt. Register by May 30! Space is limited!

BOOSTER CLUB LUNCHEONS: NEW SCHEDULE

Join us for the last two Booster Club lun-cheons of the school year on April 29th at the Coeur d’Alene Resort and May 13 at Outback. This summer we will suspend the Booster Club luncheons until school returns, on August 26 at the Coeur d’Alene Resort.

Long time NIC Wrestling Coach John Owen (center, blue shirt) was hon-ored with the Chris-tianson Gymnasium Wrestling Room dedicated on his be-half. Owen is joined by members of his family, NIC Board of Trustee members Ken Howard and Todd Banducci and NIC AD Williams, as the room was dedicated during the Tri-State Wrestling tournament.

WRESTLINGThe Cardinals wrapped up their season

with a sixth place finish at the NJCAA Na-tional Tournament in Spokane on Feb. 28th and March 1st.

V.J. Giulio came away with the 197 lb National Title and was voted the Out-standing Wrestler of the tournament becoming only the sixth NIC wrestler in our history to do so.

H e a v y w e i g h t Taylor Kornoely and Derek Booth, 174, also earned All-American hon-ors by placing sixth.

V.J . was a lso voted North Idaho College Hall of Fame Athlete of the Year.

We are busy recruiting for next year and sending our sophomores on to other Uni-versities.

We will keep you up to date on our sign-ees.

Thank you for all of your support.

WOMEN’S BASKETBALLThe Lady Cardinals finished off the sea-

son fighting as they took it down to the wire with eventual Region 18 tournament champion College of Southern Idaho.

The game could have gone either way, and we were ex-tremely proud of the heart that was displayed on the court that night. Renae Mokrzycki earned Region 18 A l l - To u r n a m e n t recognition to go along with her First Team All-SWAC honors.

Georgia Stirton was also named First Team All-SWAC and freshman Kara Staggs was Honorable Mention All-SWAC. In addition, Mokrzycki was recently named

a NJCAA DI Honorable Mention All-American.

The team finished the season with a 22-10 overall record capping off the tenth consecutive 20+ win season for Coach Chris Carlson. Congratulations ladies!

After taking two weeks off, our fresh-men have been working hard in skill devel-opment, weights, agility, and open gyms. Our recruiting efforts have been focused on bringing in just the right freshmen next year to go along with this soon to be sophomore heavy team.

MEN’S BASKETBALLThe NIC Men’s Basketball team is look-

ing to add a few pieces for next year but fortunately the Cardinals will have several players coming back.

The Cardinals will lose Braxton Tucker, who recently signed to play at Portland State University. Nathan Rathbun, Jason Wheelock and Bryce Leavitt are all still weighing their options. Cole Kelser will be heading on his LDS Mission to Russia this coming summer.

The Cardinals have replaced some of the offense they are losing by signing Lake City High star Kyle Guice for next season. Guice, a 6’8 skilled forward is ex-pected to contribute significantly for the Cards.

The rest of the Cardinals are busy with Spring work outs and focusing on academ-ics and are expecting big things for next season! Thanks for all your support!

SOFTBALLWith our first SWAC games at Memorial

Field the Cardinals faced No. 8 College of Southern Nevada. After dropping game one 5-2, the team rallied to take the next three games. Game two earned Brittany Hecker her 11th win with a 8-3 score. Game three earned Miranda Powless her 6th win of the season with a 8-5 win. Tori Almos takes

her 4th win for game four for the Cardi-nals. The Cardinals combined had 11 hits, 3 walks, and 13 runs on the Coyotes in 5 in-nings during game 4 of the series.

Madison Antho-ny started the first inning off with a 2 run home run, giv-ing the Cardinals the lead. The Car-dinals had back-to-back-to-back home runs from Hayley Fields, Samantha Luna, and Allison Paladeni in the 3rd inning helping the Cardinals to a 7-1 lead.

CSN rallied together in the 4th inning with a 3 run home run from Ariel Frantz. The Cardinals blew the game out of the water by rallying for 6 more runs for the 13-5 victory.

Hailey Fields went 9-14 on the weekend with 1 homerun, 5 doubles, 2 singles, 1 walk, and 9 RBI’s. The Cardinals next two weekends were on the road, where we took 3 of four from Snow College in Ephraim, UT. The scores were 9-3 and 8-0 on Friday and 8-0 and 6-7 on Saturday.

After a long bus ride to Carson City, Nevada the following weekend, the Cards again took 3 of 4, defeating Western Ne-vada in a tough series to reach 25-15 in SWAC play. The next home games will be April 24th and 25th vs. CSI.

GOLFBoth golf teams have continued their

strong play this spring. Each team has played 3 times.

The spring season opened up in Clarkston, WA where the weather was the main story. High winds and cold tempera-tures kept the scores high but the men man-aged to battle to a 1 shot win over Lewis & Clark State College. Angus Montgomery earned a 7th place finish, his 5th straight top 10 of the year.

The women’s team earned a 4th place finish in the event. The team then traveled to Nampa, Idaho to play in the Northwest Nazarene Invitational. Montgomery fired a

Coaches’ Reports

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CHRIS CARLSONWOMEN’S BASKETBALL

JARED PHAYMEN’S BASKETBALL

DON DON WILLIAMSSOFTBALL

PAT WHITCOMBWRESTLING

score of 5 under par for the 3 rounds earn-ing a 2 shot victory, his 2nd win of the season. The men’s team tied for the victory with Northwest Nazarene. For the women, Madi Hauck aced the par 3 12th hole. It was her second hole-in-1 on the season. She also aced the 17th hole at Avondale Golf Club on the first day of practice in Septem-ber.

Jennie Williams joined Hauck in earning top 20 finishes. The team finished 5th in the

event. Our latest event took the team to Lewiston, Idaho to compete in the Frontier Confer-ence Tournament hosted by Lewis & Clark State Col-lege.

T h e w o m e n played well, earn-ing a 4th place fin-ish in the field of 8 teams. Again, Jen-

nie Williams and Madi Hauck earned top 20 finishes.

The men struggled to play the golf course and earned a 5th place finish. Angus Montgomery led the men placing 2nd in-dividually. Both teams end their regular season at the Bigfoot Invitational in Liberty Lake, Washington hosted by The Commu-nity Colleges of Spokane.

In the most recent coaches polls the men are ranked 7th in the country and the women ranked 14th.

VOLLEYBALLThe volleyball team is wrapping up the

last week of off -season practice for the year. The ladies had their annual spring tournament at Gonzaga where they played Great Falls, Gonzaga, Carroll College and Western Montana. NIC walked away with 2 wins against Western Montana and Car-roll College and lost to Gonzaga and Great Falls in three. Overall, they did well and had a great time playing different rotations and line-ups.

With just 5 freshmen coming back we are having to focus hard on our recruit-ing. We are excited to welcome two re-

cruits who will be a part of the 2014 recrui t ing class , Jadan Ross and Ni-kaya Johnson. Ross is an outside hitter from Frenchtown, Montana and Idaho Athlete of the Year, Johnson is a libero from Eagle, Idaho.

We are excited about these two signees and look forward to more commitments in the

next month. Next week we will have our end of the

year meeting to discuss summer training and next year’s agenda. We look forward to another great volleyball season!

MEN’S SOCCERThough Cardinal Men’s Soccer only of-

ficially began spring training on April 8th, several of the men have already served the college and the department well by earning honors beyond campus.

Earlier this spring, Waldorf Athletics named Alex Olmos their male athlete of the year due to his second straight year of all-

conference honors, his work ethic, and his character. Olmos played in goal for the Cardinals in 2009 and 2010.

A l u m s K y l e Hammond and Elis-eo Santana, who now play for Cor-ban University in Salem, recently vis-ited Gonzaga Uni-versity for a spring

training match. Hammond earned a start against the Division I program. Santana en-tered as a substitute due to a muscle strain, but it didn’t take long for the former Cardi-nals to combine for a goal in which Santana slammed one into the upper right corner from 25 yards.

Several current Cardinals made the Spo-

kane Shadow’s first team. The Shadow will compete in the Evergreen Premier League of Washington. Though the league is classi-fied as an amateur division, EPLWA serves as part of soccer’s fourth division in the United States.

Adam Talley, Christian Botuli, and Rod-ger Bucknor all made the squad. Additional freshmen may join the team at the conclu-sion of spring training.

Though the window for spring training is short in the NWAACC, the Cardinals have two rivalry games set up for May. On the 2nd, the men play at Spokane Falls Com-munity College against CCS. On May 8th, the program expects to meet Walla Walla CC who are under the direction of a new coach, Ben Rotert. Until then, the men will be training and studying hard.

WOMEN’S SOCCERSpring training has ended for Major

League Baseball, but it is just getting going in earnest for Cardinals’ Women’s Soccer Team. Their first spring scrimmage was against the University of Idaho and was a

rather eye opening experience for some of the NIC women as Idaho beat them 7-1. Head men’s coach, Ken Thomp-son, was helping out and he commented, “The score probably should have been 6-2 as Natalie Mid-dleton was fouled in the penalty area and while she was

down and players were confused a foul had not been called, Idaho counterattacked and scored.”

The Cardinals women had 3 more scrim-mages. They faced Eastern Washington University Friday, April 18th in Cheney. NIC will host University of Montana on Sunday, April 27 at 11am and the Alumni game will be May 3rd at 1pm on NIC’s Eisenwinter Field.

I’ve been scrambling to get geared up for playing in the NWAACC this Fall and a big part of that has been working with current

PAGE 5

Coaches’ Reports

KEN THOMPSONMEN’S SOCCER

INTERIM COACHKELSEY STANLEY

VOLLEYBALL

DAN HOGANWOMEN’S SOCCER

DERRICK THOMPSONGOLF

PAGE 6

players and committed players to adjust their scholarships to conform to the NWAACC standards so we can possibly compete in the NWAACC playoffs next season. The change of conferences may actually help us sign more players from Seattle or Portland as now we’ll be playing games closer to those locales and families will be able to watch daughters or sisters play more often than in past years.

I hope all of you enjoy your Spring, play a little golf, and come watch us play in one of our scrimmages.

Go Cardinals!

CHEERThis year the cheerleading program raised

enough money to compete in USA College Nationals. It was exciting to return to the na-tional platform after a year absence.

The team returned with a fifth place finish in the small coed, Jr. College division! The competition was held in Anaheim, California the third week of March.

They made it past preliminaries night one, being ranked 7th.

The routine had a couple drops in skills, and some bobbles (movement in stunts). After a few adjustments, and a turnaround in their performance the Cards were moved up two spots for the final results.

USA Nationals was the first time a majori-ty of our cheerlead-ers had competed at the national level. The returners for 2014-15 are taking this experience, and using it as guid-ance for next year. The squad tenta-tively has 6 return-ers. This will be a little less than half for the 16 member competition routine next year.

Right now, the focus is on completing try outs, and getting next year’s squad ready. We hope to bring the college cheerleading camp back to NIC’s campus in August as a start to major skill development, and it helps the pro-gram get a jump start on fundraising.

LESLIE PULLEYCHEERLEADING

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