Women’s Golf

The women’s golf team made a spring break trip to Branson, Mo. in an attempt to see some nicer weather as it tried to hone its golf skills before the regular season starts.

The team was there March 8-14 and Head Coach Bob Darrah said that the weather was between 60 and 70 degrees Farenheit, which made for ideal conditions for the women to hit the links. Darrah thought his team faired well in Branson.

“That was our first time out and we did pretty well and hit the ball pretty well,” said Darrah.

Darrah did not have a full squad make the trip but said that freshman Steph Schenfeld and juniors Amber DeRiemacker and Karen Smith all played well on the second leg of their trip, which included a stop at Southwest Missouri State.

The Southwest Missouri State meet was supposed to have been an official meet, but due to time constraints the two teams only played nine holes so it was not recorded as official.

The team gets their first official meet on April 4 at the Truman State Invitational in Kirksville, Mo.

Men’s Tennis

The men’s tennis team approached the halfway point in the season to find itself up against some very tough competition.

The Storm have dropped matches to Luther and Central, two of the leagues top echelon teams as well as Graceland and the University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse.

Head Coach Bob Nutgrass said that his team has been working very hard to improve certain aspects of the game to try and improve on its 2-5 record.

“At times we play really well and at times we don’t play so well,” said Nutgrass. “We’ve just been kind of working on different parts of the game to get everybody playing a little better.”

The Storm hosted Buena Vista and Upper Iowa last weekend and improved its record to 4-5 in impressive fashion winning 7-0 in both matches.

The Storm brought home a big win on Tuesday as the team made the trip to Waverly, Iowa to take on Wartburg, a matchup that is an annual battle for conference placing.

“A big one for us is Wartburg because that’s usually year in and year out who we are competing with for fourth place in the conference,” said Nutgrass.

Women’s Tennis

Usually the men and women’s teams are separated by a fall and a spring season, but this year the women are taking part in the spring season just like the men.

This is the first time in Simpson history that the women will have a spring tennis season. The women have matches set up with Wartburg, Central, Graceland, Grinnell and a tournament at Luther.

Simpson is giving the spring season a try and so are many other IIAC teams.

Men’s Baseball

The Simpson men’s baseball team is going to be well traveled by the time the conference season starts. The Storm has already taken trips to Cocoa Beach, Fla. and to St Louis, Mo.

The men went 5-5 in Florida highlighted by an 18-3 shellacking of Washington College (Pa.).

Head Coach John Sirianni felt that his team was somewhat inconsistent in Florida but felt that the game against Washington was one where his team put it all together. “Pretty much everyone in the lineup swung the bat well. We had pretty good pitching, and we were able to do all things combined,” said Sirianni.

In Missouri the team split with Washington University winning its second contest 7-4. The Storm also split with Illinois Weslyan, with a 3-0 shutout in its first contest.

“In St. Louis I was pretty pleased with the results. We played against two of the top teams in our region. We got excellent starting pitching and played real good defense,” said Sirianni.

The conference season begins on April 4 at home against Luther College, but the Storm hosts Nebraska Wesleylan and Carleton College as well and makes a trip to Lamoni to take on Graceland College before the IIAC season begins.

Men’s Golf

The men’s golf team spent its spring break in Joplin, Mo. hoping to catch some much needed practice time before the season begins this week. The Storm were at Loma Linda Golf Resort in Joplin and got a chance to, “get the rust off” as Head Coach Larry Shoop said.

Simpson played practice rounds against Missouri Southern and Northeast Oklahoma. The Storm played 18 holes with Missouri Southern and only nine with Northeast Oklahoma.

Since the trip was just a time to practice, Shoop thought that it served its purpose. “The fruit of it is that they learned how much they have to work on their short games.”

The Storm’s top three golfers were not available for the trip but will be available for this Friday’s meet at Central College. The meet will be the Storm’s first official meet of the season.

“Some of the big schools will be their so we can get a feeler as to where we’re at early in the season,” said Shoop.