Women's Basketball

BEREA, OHIO — The Baldwin-Wallace College women’s basketball team had another outstanding season in 2007-2008.

Under the direction of veteran Head Coach Cheri Harrer, now 374-129 in 18 seasons at the College, the women finished 27-3 overall, won both the Ohio Athletic Conference regular season and OAC Tournament titles and advanced to the second round of the NCAA Division III National Tournament. The OAC regular season title was B-W’s seven in the last 10 years. Its OAC Tournament crown was the fifth in the past decade. And more importantly, the NCAA tourney berth was B-W’s 10^th in the past 13 seasons. For her efforts, Harrer was tabbed as the OAC Coach of the Year.

“We had an excellent season with great team chemistry and unity, an outstanding group of senior leaders who led by-example and a group of young women who worked hard in practice every day,” said a smiling Harrer.  “Along the way, we accomplished all but one of our goals, won a lot of games and had a lot of fun.

“I have to give a great deal of the credit for our success to our four seniors, Stacia Shrider (Marietta/ Warren Local), Selena Budge (Beachwood), Carly Flowers (North Baltimore) and Jessa Diaz (Amherst/ Marion Steele),” said Harrer. “They were unselfishly dedicated to put the team ahead of any personal goals and they led on and off the court every single day. We will certainly miss all four of them. They have been a key to our success the past four years"

Individually, four Yellow Jackets were tabbed to the All-OAC team. Budge was a first-team pick and Shrider, junior guard Amanda Mondrach (Parma/ Parma Heights Holy Name) and junior point guard Rachael Quiring (Brunswick/ Parma Hts. Holy Name) all made the honorable mention team.

In addition to excelling on the court, Harrer's team excells off of it too. Three of her players, Budge (3.86 grade point average in pre-physical therapy), Shrider (3.7 grade average in moderate and special education) and sophomore center Ariel Brough (Powell/ Olentangy Liberty/ 3.93 grade average in political science), were named Academic All-OAC.

"We are very proud of the accomplishments of our student-athletes," said Harrer, who was a scholar-athlete herself as a student at the University of Findlay. "It [success] all starts in the classroom and truly carries over to the basketball court."

In addition to winning both the OAC regular season and OAC Tournament titles, this year's team won the season-opening Anderson (Ind.) University Tip-off and the B-W Holiday Invitational tournament crowns.

Harrer's team achieved its success by numbers and effort. She rotated a group of 12 players with Shrider (23.9 minutes per game), Quiring (23.2/ mpg), Budge (22.9/ mpg) and Mondrach (22.7/ mpg) seeing the most action.

Budge led the scoring with 10.7 points per game. She also grabbed 3.7 rebounds, led the team with 66 assists and 47 steals and blocked 30 shots. Mondrach was second in scoring at 8.3 ppg., grabbed 3.1 rpg., passed for 51 assists and had a team-leading 32 three-pointers. Shrider scored 4.9 ppg. and topped the team with 6.7 rpg. Quiring scored 7.0 ppg. and had 61 assists, 24 steals and canned 17 triples. Brough scored 6.9 ppg., grabbed 5.9 rpg. and blocked a single-season school-record 59 shots.

Off the bench, Harrer alternated Flowers (7.1 ppg. and 4.6 rpg.), junior Jessica Butzer (Orrville), sophomores Serena Farage (Medina/ Buckeye) and Sasha Samara (Amherst/ Marion Steele) and first-year players Amanda Schroeder (Columbus Grove) and sisters Courtney and Carrie Ritzler (Fostoria/ Hopewell-Loudon). With 12 fresh bodies pushing the opposition up and down the court, Harrer's team had a big, big advantage.

One opposing coach was quoted as saying, "B-W has 12 players all of pretty much equal ability and that is a real advantage. The second five has just as much quality as the first five." She was right!