49ers Homecoming Weekend Recap

Women's Volleyball clinches the Big West Championship with two wins on the road, and secures NCAA Tournament berth for the 25th consecutive year. Senior Caitlin Le Doux wins Big West Player of the Week for her performance at UC Davis and the University of Pacific. Your 49ers have won the last 11 games and will return to the Walter Pyramid this weekend against UC Irvine. First serve is set to go off at 7:00PM Saturday, November 19th.

Women's Soccer wins the first round of NCAA Tournament defeating No. 7 Pepperdine 1-0 in overtime, Nadia Link scored the golden goal with 14 seconds left. Third time's the charm for Head Coach Mauricio Ingrassia and Your 49ers, this is Long Beach State's third appearance in the national tournament, and first ever NCAA Tournament win. Your 49ers will compete in the 2nd round against the University of Miami, which will be played at UCLA Drake Stadium Friday, November 18th at 5:00PM.




Women's Basketball wins home opener by 32 points against Utah Valley, final score 75-43. Tipesa Moorer captured her second career double at Long Beach State with 13 points and 11 rebounds. Sophomore Ella Clark had a career-best seven blocks which ties her for third in the program's single-game history, she also tied  career best with 16 points during the game. Your 49ers is on the road with their next game at Sacramento State November 19th at 7:05PM.




Men's Basketball is victorious on Homecoming defeating the University of Idaho 69-61 in front of 4,348 audience in the Walter Pyramid. With his stellar performance and a career high of seven assists, Larry Anderson receives Big West Player of the Week. Casper Ware register 20 points against the Vandals. Your 49ers are on the road with their next game against No. 9 Pittsburgh, November 16th Wednesday at 6:00PM PT. The game will be broadcast on ESPNU.




For more information please visit LongBeachState.com and 'LIKE' us on Facebook.com/LBSUAthletics, and follow us on Twitter.com/LBSUAthletics. GO BEACH!

Big West Tournament: Women's Soccer

Long Beach State Women's Soccer will look to defend it's Big West Championship starting Thursday, November 3rd against No. 3 Cal State Northridge. Your 49ers will host the Matadors as the second seed in the Big West, and the semifinal game is set to start 2:00PM at George Allen Field.

If the women's soccer team prevails against Cal State Northridge, Your 49ers will play against either No. 1 UC Irvine or No. 4 UC Davis Sunday, November 6th. If UC Irvine wins, Long Beach State will travel to Irvine on Sunday November to play for the Big West Championship. However, if UC Davis wins, Long Beach State will host at home on Sunday to play for the title.

Along with clinching Big West Tournament berth, junior Nadia Link was named Big West Offensive Player of the Week with her spectacular performance this past weekend. It is her second weekly honor this season, and the third of her career at Long Beach State. On the week, Link led Your 49ers in goals (2), assists (3), point (7), and shot attempts (9). She leads the Big West in goals (14), assists (10) and points (38), and ranks among the top three in the LBSU single-season record books in each of those categories. Nadia is the third 49er in school history, and the first since the program was reinstated in 1998, to register double figures in both goals and assists. Link has played a pivotal role this season in helping Long Beach State proceed into post-season play.

Your 49ers return to George Allen Field this Thursday at 2:00PM against Cal State Northridge in the semifinal of the Big West Conference Championship. For more information please visit LongBeachState.com and follow us on Facebook.com/LBSUAthletics for up-to-date information. GO BEACH!

LBSU Men's Basketball Receives Preseason Acclaim

LBSU Men's Basketball is picked as the favorite to win the Big West Title this 2011-2012 season. Along with Big West recognition, the 49ers also received two points in the ESPN/USA Today Preseason Top 25 Coaches Poll. Three players were also chosen on the six-man Preseason Media Big West All-American Conference Team.

Your 49ers received 20 out of 24 first-place votes and finished with 212 points in the preseason conference poll. Reigning Big West Conference Player of the Year, Casper Ware earned a spot on the preseason all-league team as well as Larry Anderson and T.J. Robinson. The men's basketball team completed last season with a 14-2 record in the Big West, and returns four key starters - Casper Ware, T.J. Robinson, Larry Anderson, and Eugene Phelps. 

Among other preseason accolades, Senior Casper Ware is one of 50 other basketball student-athletes in Division I to be awarded the John R. Wooden Preseason Top 50 Award, the preseason watch list for the national player of the year award. 

The LBSU Men's Basketball team will face a tough schedule early in the season, facing five teams ranked in the preseason by the coaches poll. Non-conference games include No. 1 North Carolina (Dec. 10), No. 8 Louisville (Nov. 28), No. 11 Pittsburgh (Nov. 16), No. 13 Kansas (Dec. 6), and No. 15 Xavier (Dec. 22). 

Homecoming is set on November 12, 2011 at the Walter Pyramid against Boise State at 2:05PM. For more information please visit LongBeachState.com.

Big West Athlete of the Week: Rosa Del Toro (10/18/2011)

Women's Cross Country Rosa Del Toro receives the Big West Athlete of the week for the second time this season. Del Toro led the way for Your 49ers this past weekend at the Bronco Invitational at Baylands Regional Park in Sunnyvale hosted by Santa Clara University. Del Toro recorded a new school record and a personal-best in the 5,000 meters by five seconds with a mark of 17:09.8, which helped lead the LBSU women's cross country team to defend their title at the Bronco Invitational. The 49ers compiled 94 points to beat out second-place Portland (100 points) and Idaho State (116 points) in third. 

With the win, LBSU has entered the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Women's West Region poll as No. 9. For more information about the USTFCCCA Rankings visit longbeachstate.com.


Del Toro also received LBSU Student-Athlete of the week for her endeavors. The 49ers return to action October 21 traveling to Cal State Fullerton for the Titan Invitational. 

Big West Athlete of the Week: Kaitlyn Gustaves

Senior goalkeeper Kaitlyn Gustaves has earned the Big West Women's Soccer Defensive Player of the Week. This is the first weekly honor for Gustaves and the second for Long Beach State women's soccer this season as Nadia Link was awarded the Big West Women's Soccer Offensive Player of the week on Sept. 5.

Gustaves had a strong outing on Sunday in a 2-1 overtime victory against Cal State Fullerton. After the Titans scored in the 28th minute, Gustaves did not allow another goal, which allowed senior Nicole Hubbard to score the equalizer with 14 seconds left in regulation. Senior Nadia Link would go onto the score the game winning goal four minutes into overtime. Gustaves compiled a career-high nine saves, 4 in the first half and 5 in the second, while facing 13 shots in total.

Your 49ers remain undefeated in Big West Conference play, with a solid effort from Gustaves playing every minute in goal this season. This season Gustaves has compiled 44 saves, five shutouts, and a 0.91 goals on average. Her goals against average, shutout total and minutes played, all rank among the top 10 in the 49er single-season record books.

Women's soccer hits the road this weekend at Cal State Northridge on the 14th and UC Irvine on the 16th.

Big West Athlete of the Week: Haleigh Hampton

Sophomore Haleigh Hamption was the first to pick up the women's volleyball team's weekly Big West honor this year. It was announced by the conference on Monday for the week ending on October 9th.
 
Playing Tuesday October 4th at UC Irvine, Hampton had nine kills on .500 hitting while leading the 49ers to a 3-0 sweep on the road against the Anteaters. Your 49ers marked an impressive error-free performance at UCI, and Hampton earned the award in the wake of her second double-double of the year against Cal State Fullerton later that week on Saturday. Against the defending Big West Champions, Hampton made 13 kills on .417 hitting, and also held an impressive 10 blocks - 3 solo and 7 block assists. With Haleigh Hampton's solid performance on the offensive and defensive sides, the 49ers defeated the Titans in four sets.

Hampton's award as the Big West Player of the Week honor is the first for Long Beach State in the 2011 season. It's also the first career Player of the Week award for Hampton as well.

Women's Volleyball will continue Big West Conference play this weekend against UC Davis on the 14th and the University of Pacific on the 15th. First serve at 7PM at The Walter Pyramid.

Big West Athletes of the Week (9/6): Heath Reedy & Rosa Del Toro

Long Beach State 49ers Heath Reedy and Rosa Del Toro had great success in each of their respective races at the Asics Fullerton Season Opener. Both runners won their events and earned this season's first Big West Cross Country Athlete of the Week honors.

Heath Reedy returns for his second year at Long Beach State with a great start being the first to finish with the top time of 25:0.4, 11 seconds ahead of second place Tyler Reed of Cal State Fullerton. 

Senior Rosa Del Toro led the 49ers women's cross country team to a second place finish after winning the women's 6K with a time of 22:03.7. Del Toro bested the second place finisher, Karen Rosas of Glendale, by nearly five seconds.

Cross country returns to action this week at the UC Irvine Invitational September 10th. Please visit longbeachstate.com for more information!

Track and Field: Big West Awards

Hot off the heels of LBSU Men's Track and Field program winning the Big West Championship, top honors have been awarded to the 49ers with Colin Dunbar taking home Field Athlete of the Year and head coach Andy Sythe taking home his third Big West Coach of the Year award.

Dunbar, a senior thrower, had an outstanding season, being named Big West Field Athlete of the Week on four separate occasions. Most recently, he won both the discus and hammer throw at the Big West Championships to propel Long Beach State to the conference title. He placed third in the shot put and seventh in the javelin, becoming only the second athlete in conference history to score in all four throwing events.

Throughout the season, Dunbar established lifetime bests of 223-06 in the hammer throw, 177-5 in the discuss, and 55-02.75 in the shot put.

After leading the men's track and field team to a Big West Championship Coach Sythe was awarded BW Coach of the Year for the third time, his first since 2008. LBSU claimed five individual titles at the league meet as well as the decathlon event, earning the most points by a club since the last time the 49ers won the BW title in 2008.

LBSU track and field now moves on to the NCAA West Preliminary rounds May 26-28 in Eugene, Ore.

Softball: award re-cap and NCAA tournament preview

After completing a stellar 2011 regular season, Long Beach State now has the hardware to back it up.

Big West Awards

The headliner for LBSU was Erin Jones-Wesley, who is only the second pitcher (teammate Brooke Turner was the first) ever to be named both Big West Pitcher of the Year and BW Freshman Pitcher of the Year. Jones-Wesley posted a stat line of 22 wins (led BW), 1.45 ERA (led BW) and 163 strikeouts in 183.2 innings pitched.

Jones-Wesley joins senior third baseman Liz Javier (.325 batting average, 2 HR, 25 RBI), and freshman outfielder Hannah De Gaetano (.328 batting average, 2 HR, 17 RBI) on the All Big West First team.

Long Beach State had three representatives on Second Team All Big West: senior first baseman Christina Schallig (.344 batting average in league games, 4 HR, 17 RBI), sophomore second baseman Nalani St. Germain (.320 batting average, 8 HR, 29 RBI), and freshman designated player Sarah Carrasco (.328 batting average, 2 HR, 20 RBI)

Pitchers Taylor Petty and Brooke Turner earned honorable mention all Big West accolades.

NCAA Tournament 

Post season play will kick off for LBSU softball on Friday at 2:30 p.m. in a rematch with San Diego State. Long Beach will play in the Tempe, Ariz. regional with host team and No. 1 overall seed Arizona State. North Dakota State is the other team in the regional.

All games in the Tempe regional will be broadcast on ESPNU.

For NCAA Tourney softball updates, be sure to stay tuned to LongBeachState.com as well as LBSU's social media outlets:


facebook.com/LBSUathletics
twitter.com/LBSUathletics

NCAA Softball has their own social media outlets that will also be updating constantly about the tournament:

facebook.com/ncaawcws

twitter.com/ncaasoftball
hashtag: #wcws

Big West Athlete of the Week (4.11): Colin Dunbar

Colin Dunbar is selected as the Big West Athlete of the Week for his performance in the Big West Cup Challenge on 4.8.11. Dunbar's performance in the hammer at the event earns his spot in the LBSU history books as he is second only to Bill Green. Watch Colin talk about representing LBSU and how to throw shot put.

Even more Big West Athletes of the Week honored

So many Big West honors, such little time! Coriann Snyder and Klaudia Malenovska were the latest 49ers to garner conference recognition this past week.

Snyder, a freshman 2-Meter helped lead the 49ers to a 3-1 record at the LMU Invitational this past weekend.

No. 10 Long Beach State played four matches at the LMU Invitational, but Snyder was at her best when the team needed it the most, in a win over No. 18 Princeton and a near-upset of the host Lions, ranked No. 6 in the nation.

In the first match of the weekend against the Tigers, Snyder scored a pair of goals as the 49ers defeated Princeton 7-5. The freshman from Porterville, Calif., also scored a pair of goals as No. 10 Long Beach State nearly toppled No. 6 LMU on the road, losing 5-4, leading all scorers. In blowout wins over Sonoma State and CS San Bernardino, Snyder scored an additional goal while the 49ers primarily went to the bench throughout the second half of each contest.

 

Sophomore Malenovska earned Big West recognition after completing her first full week of competition, and won four matches for Long Beach State as the 49ers defeated Louisville before getting nipped by No. 30 Pepperdine 4-3.

Malenovska remained unbeaten in singles play, improving to 4-0 by winning two matches at No. 2 singles. First, Malenovska defeated Louisville's Mandy Brown 6-0, 6-3, before taking down Pepperdine's Ale Granillo 6-3, 6-4.

Malenovska also paired with Anais Dallara to win twice in doubles against both teams, helping the 49ers win the doubles point in each of their matches last weekend. The pair topped Fellerhoff/Shine of Louisville 8-5 before clinching a 2-1 doubles win against Pepperdine with a win over Issara/Zalameda 8-6.

Big West Track and Field Athletes of the week (3/21/2011)

For back to back weeks, Colin Dunbar and Tara Ross were named the men's and women's Big West Field Athletes of the Week the conference office announced Wednesday afternoon.

At the USC Invitational last Friday, Dunbar finished third overall in the hammer throw with a lifetime-best 213-06. That mark also ranks him third in school history. The following day, Dunbar competed in the shot put, discus and javelin at the Aztec Invitational. The Santa Barbara, Calif., native notched a runner-up performance in the shot put with a personal-record 54-05.50, while placing 12th in the javelin (159-00) and 13th in the discus (149-00).

Ross, meanwhile, was Long Beach State's top finisher in the women's javelin at the Aztec Invitational as she took second with a season-best 160-00. The Mission Viejo, Calif., native now ranks fourth on the 49er all-time charts.

Big West Pitcher of the Week: Erin Jones-Wesley 3-21-2011

Freshman phenom Erin Jones-Wesley continues to roll, as she picked up her third Big West Pitcher of the week award following a week of going 2-0 with an 0.47 ERA for the 49ers last week, including throwing a one-hitter in a 1-0 win over Illinois.

Here is a video interview with the young pitcher following another complete game shutout that she handed the Ohio Bobcats on March 23 in mid week action.

Athlete of the Week: Deborah Armstrong

Long Beach State senior, Deborah Armstrong, won her second Student-Athlete of the Week honor on the season as she won her 174th career match (against Colombia), making her the school’s all-time leader in victories.

Armstrong is a finance major, originally from England, who has been recognized with numerous accolades on the court since High School. Her High School World Junior ranking was 238, and she competed in 2006 Wimbledon Junior Championship. She has continued to impress since setting foot on the Long Beach State campus where she has received Big West honors every season.

Deborah came into the season 30 wins behind Hannah Grady for the all time combined (singles and doubles) category. Deborah has lead the Women’s team to an impressive 10-3 record on the season, while accumulating her own fantastic statistics and leaving her mark on school history by besting Grady’s record with 9 schools left to face this season.

During her interview with the Black and Gold Insider last month Deborah stated, “to bleed black and gold is to fight for every game and stay out on the court as long as it takes.” This past week’s performance proves that she will continue to do just that, while setting school records.

Big West Conference Basketball Awards Wrapup

The Long Beach State men's and women's basketball teams may need to take out some additional trophy space in the Pyramid to show off all the hardware they took home today as the Big West Conference announced their end of the season awards today.

Women's hoops
A sensational senior and freshman phenom of the LBSU women's basketball both captured accolades for the 49ers.

Courtney Jacob was named Best Hustle Player in the Big West Conference as well as being named second team All-Big West. Jacob averaged a team leading 14.4 points, 6.8 rebounds and 3.7 assists per game along with winning back-to-back BW Player of the Week honors.

Brandi Henton was chosen as the Big West Freshman of the year, as she averaged 14.1 points and 4.9 rebounds per contest in Big West play. Henton is just the second player in LBSU history to be named BW Freshman of the year, and was also named to the Big West All-Freshmen team.

Men's hoops
LBSU men's basketball will be carrying the number one seed this week in to the Big West Conference tournament in Anaheim, and all five starters that will take the court for the 49ers were recognized by the Big West, with Casper Ware leading the charge earning Player of the Year honors as well as Defensive Player of the Year, the first time a player has ever won both of those awards.

Ware, a junior point guard, averaged 16.9 ppg, while handing out a season total of 141 assists and 53 steals, he was second on the team in 3-pointers made with 61. While leading the team in scoring, and running the offense, Ware was often also tasked with guarding the opponents best guard, and he and his squad turned in many strong defensive efforts, including holding Big West foes under 60 points seven different times.

Ware joins junior guard Larry Anderson as first-team All-Big West Selections. This marks the second time Anderson was named to the first-team. Anderson averaged 14.3 points and 6.0 rebounds, even more impressive considering he suffered a broken hand that sidelined him for several weeks.

T.J. Robinson was named second team All-Big West after averaging a double-double for the second consecutive year. Robinson finished with averages of 13.6 points and 10.1 rebounds per game.

Rounding out the all-conference selections were Eugene Phelps and Greg Plater, both selected BW Honorable Mention. Plater led the league in three pointers made with 85 3-pointers made on the season. Phelps averaged 10.2 points and 6.7 rebounds per game, and finished fifth in blocked shots.

And last, but certainly not least, head coach Dan Monson takes home his first Big West Coach of the Year Honor for leading the 49ers to a 20-10 record, including 14-2 in Big West Play.

Big West Pitcher of the Week- Andrew Gagnon

LBSU pitcher Andrew Gagnon received multiple accolades this week for his stellar performance against #16 Arizona. Andrew struck out 7 over 7.2 innings, leading the Dirtbags to victory. Andrew is a junior majoring in communications who won the Friday Night Starter position last season. He sat down with the Black and Gold Insider to discuss his awards, the pronunciation of his last name, and his Beach Pride.