Football falls just short
The Grand Valley State University Lakers’ football team lost just two games in 2023, making the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division II playoffs for the third straight season. After losing their first game of the year to the Colorado School of Mines on the road in Golden, Colorado, the Lakers won eleven straight games before falling to Harding University, the eventual national champions, in the semifinals by a narrow score of 7-6.
The Lakers and first-year head coach Scott Wooster faced one of the toughest schedules in the nation. They fell just short of the ultimate goal of winning the national championship and finished 11-2 after making a run in the postseason and winning the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletics Conference (GLIAC) championship this past season.
That included beating rival Ferris State University for a second time during the 2023 campaign and beating Pittsburg State University. Ferris State, Pittsburg State and Harding were the third, fourth and fifth ranked schools in the nation.
As it turned out, Harding and the Colorado School of Mines, the Lakers’ only two losses, met in the national championship game on Dec. 16. Harding blew the top off of Mines in a massive 38-7 victory.
GV soccer makes run to the Elite Eight
In her second season at the helm of the GVSU women’s soccer team, Katie Hultin took her team deep into the NCAA Tournament, winning three games and making the Elite Eight.
The Lakers came into the tournament as the number three seed in the Midwest Region, beating six seed McKendree University and seven seed Maryville University, before having to face off against two number one seeds.
The first one seed that GVSU played was Ashland University. Ashland was undefeated at 19-0-4 entering the game, as the Lakers were 15-3-6. Avenging the 1-0 home loss in the first game of the year against Ashland, the Lakers came out on top with the same score of 1-0 in a road win over three months later.
GVSU ultimately fell to Washburn University 1-0 in the Elite Eight. Washburn would go on to make the national championship before losing to Point Loma Nazarene University.
Hultin now moves to a career record of 30-6-11 overall and 18-2-8 in the GLIAC. Hultin put this 2023 Elite Eight appearance under her belt, along with a 2022 Sweet Sixteen appearance, a 2022 GLIAC postseason and regular season championship.
GVSU men’s wrestling on a roll in inaugural season
The GVSU men’s wrestling team is currently ranked sixteenth in the nation, according to a National Wrestling Coaches Association poll released on Dec. 22. GVSU’s head coach, Joey Simcoe, led his team to a 7-2 record.
On Saturday, Jan. 6, the Lakers traveled to the Mountain Cat Duals in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. There, they beat ninth ranked University of North Carolina-Pembroke and unranked Frostburg State University, before losing to the host of the tournament.
The eleventh ranked University of Pittsburgh-Johnstown handed the Lakers a 29-13 loss– GVSU’s first of the new year and first since taking on the University of Campbellsville-Harrodsburg on Dec. 2.
Simcoe and the Lakers have produced four players ranked in the top twelve of their weight classes nationwide. 125 pounder Aaron Lucio is ranked eighth, 149 pounder Chris Donathan is ranked third, 174 pounder Josh Kenny is ranked third and 197 pounder Wyatt Miller is ranked twelfth.
