Alumni

Foresters Two-Season Record
124–73–9 Overall

By Mike Wajerski
Sports Information Director

After the Lake Forest College fall athletic teams completed a record-setting season, the winter sports teams joined in, and now sports at Lake Forest are enjoying an unprecedented level of success. Teams from those two seasons combined for a remarkable 124–73–9 overall record (.624 winning percentage) and an even more impressive 59–31–6 mark (.646) in conference play. The victory total heading into the spring is higher than in any year in school history as the success of the Foresters continues.

Men’s Basketball
The Foresters posted an overall record of 14–10 and, for the second year in a row, a Midwest Conference mark of 10–6. The team moved up one spot to third place in the league standings but fell in the semifinals of the conference tournament. During the 16-game MWC schedule, Lake Forest led the league in field goal percentage, three-point field goal percentage, and free throw percentage.
 With a 72–64 overtime victory at home against Illinois College on February 16, nine-year head coach Chris Conger became the first coach in the program’s history to reach 100 career victories.

The Foresters won seven consecutive games early in the year, including two in Las Vegas at the D–III Desert Shootout, and five in a row late in the season. The team prevailed in eight of its ten home games, including seven of eight against fellow MWC teams. With only one player graduating in May, the squad appears poised to continue its climb up the conference standings next year.

Women’s Basketball
Lake Forest finished the 2004–05 season with a 14–10 overall record and an 11–5 mark in Midwest Conference play, taking fourth place in the league standings. The Foresters made their ninth consecutive trip to the four-team MWC Championship Tournament, despite losing a pair of first- team all-conference seniors to season-ending injuries in late December. A semifinal loss to the tourney hosts prevented the team from playing in its sixth championship game in seven years.

Head coach Jackie Slaats earned Co-Coach of the Year honors in the MWC, the fifth time in her 19-year career that she has at least shared the award. She now has 327 career victories, including 14 or more in 18 consecutive seasons.

The team hovered around the .500 mark for the first 14 games of the year before winning seven of its final nine regular season games. Replacing the Foresters’ senior class will be difficult, as three of its six members rank among the top 10 scorers in the program’s history.

Men’s Hockey
With a 7–7–0 record in Northern Collegiate Hockey Associa-tion play, Lake Forest placed fifth and traveled to UW–Stevens Point for the NCHA Peters Cup Playoffs. Despite the Foresters’ underdog status, 4–3 and 6–1 victories over the Pointers made Lake Forest just the second team in league history to sweep a quarterfinal series on the road. However, a hard-fought 2–1 loss in the semifinals at St. Norbert College, the top-ranked team in the nation, ended the Foresters’ season the next weekend with a 13–14–1 overall record.

Nine of Lake Forest’s losses came against teams ranked among the top 15 in the nation at season’s end. Head coach Tony Fritz, in his 27th year behind the Forester bench, ran his career win total to 316.
 Fritz’s biggest challenge for next year will be to replace the team’s nine seniors. The group, which includes five forwards, two defensemen, and statistically the two best goaltenders in school history, has accounted for 130 goals, 188 assists, and 3,430 saves over the last four seasons.

Women’s Hockey
With an 8–9–6 overall record, the Foresters claimed six more victories and five more ties than last season and are clearly headed in the right direction. The team finished the Northern Collegiate Hockey Association schedule at 1–5–4, with one of the ties spoiling the conference champion’s perfect league record and another coming against the second-place team.

Four-year head coach Susie Bellizzi led the program to its best season a few years ago and; with just three seniors on the largest roster in the program’s history, the team is poised to improve on that performance in 2005–06 under a new coach. Bellizzi, who resigned her position after the season, will likely coach again but decided that it was time for a change.

Fifteen Foresters lit the lamp this season and 20 recorded at least one point. Both totals are easily the highest in the team’s five-year history. The team’s top five scorers and both of its goaltenders are expected to return in 2005–06.

Swimming and Diving
Lake Forest’s women placed second at the Midwest Conference Championship meet, and the men were third, just 14 points out of second. It marked the 22nd year in a row that both squads finished among the top three in the league. In addition, Forester athletes placed first in eight of the competition’s 30 individual events.

With both the women’s MWC Swimmer and Diver of the Year on his squad, head coach Alec Webster has now directed athletes to six of the conference’s yearly honors in as many seasons at the helm of the program.

The women finished the year with a dual meet record of 6–1, while the men won three of seven meets. The teams also competed in a pair of invitational meets and a quadrangular against some of the top programs in the country. Only three women and one member of the men’s squad are scheduled to graduate in May, so an even stronger run at a conference title is possible next year.

Handball
For the second time in team history, the Foresters captured all three titles — men’s, women’s, and combined—at the United States Handball Association Collegiate National Championships. Lake Forest has now won five consecutive women’s crowns, five of the last eight men’s, and five of six combined. The men scored 1,038 points, just five more than the runner-up, and the women had a 65-point advantage with 1,021.

For Michael E. Dau ’58, the only head coach in the program’s 37-year history, the three championships raise his career total to 27. He has also directed players to 120 Handball All-America honors, including two in 2005.

Forester players also competed at the Milwaukee Classic, Circle City Open, and various Illinois Handball Association singles and doubles tournaments. Three of the 11 women on the team are seniors and among the squad’s top six players. On the men’s side, five of the 12 players are in their final
season, but four of the top six will return next year.

Mike Wajerski is Sports Information Director at the College.