Score One's impact on Saxon Athletics ? Alfred University Online ...

By Paul Vecchio, Alfred University director of athletics

The Score One for AU program comes at a most critical time in our Athletics Department history. As we continue to support the goals and mission of Alfred University, our athletics program will continue to play a major role in the areas of admissions, retention, health and wellness of our student body, school spirit, faculty and staff, and the unique bond that successful athletics programs have with their school, community and alumni.?

In the highly competitive Empire 8 Conference, where we measure ourselves both on the fields of play and in the halls of academia with rivals like St. John Fisher, Ithaca, Nazareth and others, we have struggled to keep pace in a crucial component that impacts student-athlete experience and recruiting: facilities that allow our student-athletes to reach their highest level of potential while coordinating efficiently with their commitment to academic study.?

To that end, the initial projects now under way in the Score One program stand to make an enormous impact on our Saxon student-athletes, and indeed, our entire campus. Start with the McLane Annex being connected to our main physical education facility. With three full courts with an adaptable rubber surface and a synthetic indoor track, we will give intercollegiate sports like soccer, lacrosse, tennis and track and field a true indoor venue that will unclog our main floor in the McLane Center and save expenses on our women?s tennis team traveling to indoor sites to practice.

Most significant is the impact this will make on the AU student body at large that will now have access to an enormous amount of indoor space for recreation, intramurals and club sports. In addition, our AU faculty and staff will now have an indoor venue on campus, when paired with the Gibbs Fitness Center in McLane, which can truly bring health and wellness into focus for 12 months a year in the village of Alfred.

In addition to the McLane Annex, just a few hundred feet further past the tennis courts will stand Alfred?s first-ever home softball venue. Already boasting a strong record on the diamond ? which includes a 2010 NCAA appearance ? the softball team will no longer face a drive to Hornell for both practice and competition and the stadium will be one of the more unique in Division III.

With ample bleacher seating, as well as the ability to fill the nearby hillside next to Main Street with students and fans, the Saxons softball team should possess a tremendous home field advantage as the program continues to grow in prominence, having already successfully recruited student-athletes from as far away as Texas, Oregon, and California.

Already completed this summer is brand new locker space for our women?s basketball, volleyball, and softball teams adjacent to the main entrance of the McLane Center. This upgrade also had a positive effect on our women?s swimming team whose locker room adjoins the new space.

That will hopefully just be the beginning of refurbishments needed in the facility, now more than 40 years old. The original hardwood floor in the main gymnasium needs replacement and there is significant work to be done in the pool.

Lastly, with over 300 of our over 500 student-athletes competing in field sports ? football, men?s and women?s soccer and men?s and women?s lacrosse ? we are in great need of another 100 yards of field space. While Merrill Field continues to be one of the great venues in all of Division III athletics ? particularly after new bleachers and field turf were installed two years ago ? the jockeying for practice space becomes a distraction to our student-athletes as well as a recruiting hindrance that none of our Empire 8 brethren face.

Score One for AU has the ability to transport our athletics programs to the same heights that we have come to expect from Alfred University?s outstanding academic programs and beautiful, inviting campus. While we are clearly on the right track, our final destination will need further investment from our passionate alumni, who like me, know that Alfred University is a truly special place that deserves to have the opportunity to bring much pride to its alumni and to raise its profile to the highest heights for the coming generation of college students.

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Source: http://alfredmagazine.alfred.edu/post.cfm/score-one-s-impact-on-saxon-athletics

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