Perhaps the biggest week in Cortland State athletics, involving the women’s lacrosse and baseball teams each earning NCAA Division III championships, carried a distinct West Genesee flavor.
On the lacrosse field, it was juniors Liz LaComb and Nicole Bello, along with freshman Hannah Elmer, leading the Red Dragons to its first-ever national title, while in baseball junior Turner Parry played a role in a record-breaking season for Cortland’s diamond heroes.
Cortland State’s women’s lacrosse roster is full of Central New York homegrown talent, and over the years it had made numerous NCAA Division III appearances, but had not won it all.
That changed in 2015. the Red Dragons went 22-1, its lone blemish a 13-11 defeat to Salisbury on March 22 before Cortland State closed the season on a 19-game win streak.
After beating Fredonia 15-6 in the SUNYAC final, Cortland State went to the NCAA Division III tournament, where it routed Castleton (21-4) and Augustana (21-2) and then, in the May 17 quarterfinal, survived a tense 13-12 battle with Catholic, nearly blowing a 9-2 halftime lead before hanging on, LaComb earning a pair of goals in tha ggame.
Moving on to championship weekend at PPL Park in Philadelphia, Cortland State beat Middlebury, 19-12, in the semifinals on May 23. A day later, in the championship game against Trinity College, the outcome was never in doubt as the Red Dragons won, 17-6, with Elmer pouring in four goals to tie Brewster’s Kristen Ohberg for the team lead as Bello contributed two goals.
Bello finished the season with 35 goals and 19 assists, also picking up 26 ground balls, while Elmer had 32 goals and 23 assists and LaComb contributed nine goals.
Meanwhile, Cortland State’s baseball team was in the midst of a remarkable campaign of its own, going 45-4 to set a school record for victories and claim the NCAA title.
After a 17-1 run through the SUNYAC regular season, the Red Dragons lost in the conference tournament final to St. John Fisher 12-8, but would not lose again.
Invited into the NCAA Division III tournament, Cortland State swept past Oberlin, Amherst and RPI (twice) in the regional round at Auburn’s Falcon Park to earn a trip to the Division III World Series, held in Grand Chute, Wisconsin.
Three more wins – one over Webster (12-4), two over Frostburg State (4-1 and 17-4) set up the best-of-three championship series against Wisconsin-La Crosse, where the Red Dragons won the opener 11-3 and, in the second game, scored five runs in the ninth inning to prevail, 6-2, and claim the national championship for the first time after 12 previous Division III World Series apperances.
Parry pitched in eight games for a total of 11 1/3 innings, recording 18 strikeouts, and allowing 13 walks. He was one of five Section III alumni on the Cortland State roster that included Cicero-North Syracuse’s Justin Teague (who scored the winning run in the final against Wisconsin-La Crosse), Cortland High School’s Connor Griffin, New Hartford’s Connor Manderson and Ilion’s Tyler Brien.
