A freshman tennis player for the Simpson women’s tennis team, Tracy Schiltz, walked away with Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference player of the week for her outstanding performance as both a singles player and a doubles teammate.

“She deserved this honor,” said Head Coach Bob Nutgrass. “She’s been playing great.”

Schiltz is currently the number three singles player and on the number two doubles team with junior Amanda Byas.

“I was pretty surprised to hear I got player of the week,” said Schiltz. “I wasn’t sure what to expect at the beginning of the year.”

Schiltz had a 6-2 record last week after achieving four singles victories over Grinnell, Buena Vista, Cornell and Coe.

“Tracy was the only one to get a win over Cornell,” said Nutgrass. “That was a huge thing considering Cornell is the conference champion.”

“Our season is going well,” said Schiltz. “We are still experimenting with the final line-up.”

The women’s tennis team has some tough meets coming up. They travel to Pella this Saturday, Sept. 28 to take on Loras and Dubuque and travel to Cedar Rapids on Oct. 5 to take on Luther.

“We’ll go tough against Loras,” said Schiltz. “But Luther will probably be our toughest match.”

“Tracy is a great addition to the new group of players that we have,” said Nutgrass. “And her game will just continue to get better.”

Senior Tony Ekman has received the honor of Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference player of the week for his performance in men’s cross-country.

“It was a well deserved award,” said Head Coach Erin Bresnan. “Tony had excellent placing at [the Augustana College Open], and I’m glad to see him get recognized.”

According to the Iowa Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Web site, Ekman finished fifth out of 62 runners with a time of 21:03.60. Ekman was less than a minute behind the race winner.

“I was kind of shocked when I found out about it,” said Ekman. “I didn’t even know about it until later in the week.”

“Tony is very important to the team,” said Bresnan. “His skill and leadership are key.”

The men face some challenging competition in the next two weeks. The St. Olaf Classic is tomorrow at 4 p.m. and the Simpson Buxton is at 11:45 a.m. next Saturday

“Everyone takes on a leadership role,” said Ekman. “Our team started off well, but we were disappointed when we found out our best runner couldn’t run. We all stepped up at that point.”

“There is no number one runner on our team,” said Ekman. “There is no selfishness. We train together and push each other equally hard.”

“Tony definitely keeps things interesting,” said Bresnan.