By ryan January 29, 2001
After a tough loss last weekend to Army, the Cornell men’s swimming and diving team rebounded Saturday at Colgate, defeating the Red Raiders 136-93. Once again, senior Will Norgard and senior diver Jon Cebulski were top scorers for the Red. Norgard won both the 50-yard and the 100-yard freestyle events, in 21.57 and 47.89. “Will’s been racing. He has been in the program, now for four years, and has really come in to his own,” Head Coach Joe Lucia said. The Red swept the top three spots in both of those events. On the other hand, Cebulski took both the 1- and 3-meter dives. He won the 1-meter with a score of 267.15, and the 3-meter with a 247.95, more than 22 points ahead of Colgate’s second place finisher. Junior Ryan Buckham also had a strong race for the Red, swimming on both first-place-finishing relay teams, while also taking second in the 200-yard freestyle, with a time of 1:46.62. Freshmen Jay Thielker ended up winning the 200-yard freestyle in 1:46.06. Other winners for Cornell were junior John Kenny, who won 1000-yard freestyle in 9:50.72 and sophomore Bill Dillon, who took first place in both the 200-yard individual medley and the 200-yard backstroke. “It wasn’t a high pressure meet for us,” Lucia said, “but it was still a good win.” Next week, the Red travels to Providence to face off against two of the top teams in the Ivy League, Brown and Columbia. “Next week will determine how the Championships go, we will be resting mostly in practice so we can swim fast,” Lucia said. With the win, the Red moves to 2-5 overall, with Championships just a month away. The men return home in two weeks, when it faces Harvard and Dartmouth. Women Dominate With the Cornell women’s swimming and diving team’s win on Saturday, it now has a three meet win streak going in to the last two meets of the season. The Red defeated the Red Raiders 129-109. Junior Yoko Shibata was the top scorer for the Red, taking both the 100-yard and the 200-yard freestyle events. The Red also placed second in the 100 and third in the 200. “We went in thinking that it was going to be close. I am very impressed with how we swam,” coach Marrie Neumer said. Junior Tina Shih rounded out Cornell’s sweep of the freestyle events, taking the 50-yard freestyle in 25.24. The Red also placed high in many of the distance events. Junior Virginia Morgan won the 1,000-yard freestyle, taking it in 10:42.02, more than 10 seconds faster than her nearest competitor. Junior Whitney Gates also took the 200-yard backstroke, earning the Big Reds sixth individual event victory of the day. In addition, Cornell won the 400-medley relay with a time of 4:04.05. Juniors Karen Tornabene and Shayne Geneva, freshmen Megan Gutman, and senior tri-captain Kellee Ngan each swam a leg of the relay. One of the top stories coming out of the women’s swimming and diving team is the multitude of injuries. Senior tri-captain suffered a concussion over break and is not at full strength. Freshman Jamie Mayjek and junior Heather Dombrady are both battling shoulder injuries, and a number of other swimmers are battling the flu. “We are pretty tied and broken down, but we want to give Columbia a run next weekend,” Neumer said. With the win, the red moves to 4-4 overall and 2-4 in the Ivy’s. There are four weeks until the Ivy Championships and the women are already beginning to prepare. “We have already begun to pre-taper, and I believe we have a chance to finish five out of eight at Ivy’s,” Neumer added. The Red takes on Ivy rivals Columbia and Brown, next weekend in Providence. Archived article by Josh Vlasto
By ryan January 29, 2001
A three-student team from the Johnson Graduate School of Management’s MBA program won first place at the second annual Citigroup/Salomon Smith Barney E-Commerce Case Competition in New York City on Dec. 1. The team, consisting of Allan Aks JGSM ’02, Greg Hubbell JGSM ’02 and Sean Neville JGSM ’02, was awarded a prize of $10,000. Each team chose one of 23 real-life business issues that Citigroup and Solomon Smith Barney (SSB) faces with the advent of the Internet. The Johnson Graduate School of Management was one of five business schools invited by Citigroup to participate in the competition. The other business schools were from University of Pennsylvania (Wharton), University of Michigan, Columbia University and New York University (Stern). “They are all top schools. We thought the competition was going to be pretty stiff but we were able to bring in the first place trophy to the Johnson School and Cornell,”Aks said. Executives from SSB judged their solutions on ease of implementation and creativity. The teams were also evaluated on their presentation and their knowledge of the problem. The Johnson School team chose to focus on how the Internet will affect children’s interaction with service firms. “We proposed financial service firms need to build relationships with children by educating them about fiscal responsibility and by preparing them to be business leaders of tomorrow,” Aks said. To accomplish this, the team built a website that used bright colors, graphics and music to keep children interested. “If you want to grab kids’ attention, you have to play by their rules,” Hubbell said. The website included a game zone and used cartoon characters as virtual consultants to teach children about savings, interest and small business. “We took a very original approach and that is what let us win. The other presentations were out of a classroom,” said Hubbell. “They did a marvelous job,” said William Huling, senior director of corporate programs at JGSM, who attended the competition with the team. “They were so far above the others in how they presented their presentation and how they connected with the audience.” Along with the financial benefit of winning the competition, the team also took home less tangible prizes. “It’s a great way to enhance our business school experience outside of the classroom,” Aks said. Huling added, “The school [Cornell] also earned bragging rights over the other top business schools …” To qualify for last month’s competition, the team first competed Nov. 11 in Ithaca against 11 other teams of MBA students. The students won a $5000 prize from that contest.Archived article by Luke Hejnar