LETTER TO THE EDITOR | Looking in the Locker Room Mirror

To the Editor:

Over the past few weeks, several of our fellow Ivy League athletics teams made headlines for engaging in some appalling actions. The Harvard Men’s Soccer and Men’s Cross Country teams both created spreadsheets to assess the physical attractiveness and sexual appeal of their female student-athlete counterparts and freshmen recruits. These “scouting reports” contained degrading, sexually explicit language about these women, many of whom were their friends. At Columbia, the Men’s Wrestling team is currently under investigation for racially and sexually explicit group messages. As captains and leaders of varsity athletics teams at Cornell, we are deeply disappointed by these acts.

FOOTBALL | Red Hopes for Repeat of Last Year’s Empire State Bowl

Will history repeat itself? 364 days after clinching its only win of the 2014 season over Columbia, the Red have the chance to do the same in 2015. Both games come off a loss to Dartmouth in which the Red were only able to produce one score. The task against Columbia will not be easy, as the Lions have impressed through wins against Wagner College and an upset over Yale. The Red are coming off a rollercoaster of a loss against Dartmouth, showing strong defensive stands and holding a 3-0 lead going into the second quarter.

VOLLEYBALL | Volleyball to Take on Seventh Place Columbia

By OLIVIA MATTYASOVSZKY

The Cornell volleyball team will enter into the second half of its Ivy League scheduled play Saturday at Columbia. The team currently hold a 4-13 overall record, with an Ivy record of 0-7, good for eighth in the Ivy league. Columbia enters the matchup at 5-11 overall and stands just about Cornell in seventh place in the league. Last time the Red played the Lions, the team started off strong. The first set belonged to Cornell, with freshman Alex Basler, junior Macey Wilson and sophomore Emily Wemhoff leading the stat sheet with big numbers in the front row.

VOLLEYBALL | Red Drops Four Sets to Columbia

By OLIVIA MATTYASOVSZKY

On Saturday, Cornell hosted Columbia in their first Ivy League match of the season. The Red entered the weekend with a 4-6 record, and the Lions came in with a 2-7 record. After hosting the Big Red Invitational last weekend, the Red was hard at work on the fundamentals in preparation for entering Ivy League play. “At time last weekend we saw how good we can be when we play together as a team,” said junior setter Alyssa Phelps. “We worked a lot in practice on being disciplined and blocking and we executed both of those things very well on Saturday.

Softball Locks Up First Place in Ivy South

With three wins over Columbia this weekend, the softball team has already wrapped up the Ivy League South Division crown. Cornell still has two doubleheaders with second-place Princeton (8-8) next weekend, but at 13-3, Cornell has a five-game lead and the divisional crown for the first time since the Ivy League switched to a two-division format in 2007.
“It’s amazing,” said sophomore pitcher Elizabeth Dalrymple. “When we found out today [that we won the division] it was just an incredible feeling. We’re so happy for the seniors who’ve been working for four years.”

Baseball Goes 3-1 vs. Defending Ivy League Champs

We’ve all heard the clichés. A team that struggles one season will undoubtedly enter the next season talking about a return to contention. Optimistic players and coaches will explain that if the team plays hard, does the little things and catches a few breaks, it can return to respectability. However, more often than not, last place teams — such as the 2008 Cornell baseball team — wind up near the bottom of the standings the next season.

Softball Four-by-Four

Whenever the softball team has faltered this season, whether in one game or back-to-back contests, it has rebounded in commanding fashion. The Red will hope to do the same this weekend when it travels to New York City to take on Columbia at Baker Athletics Complex in a four-game series.
“Our goal is always to win all four games,” said junior second baseman Devon March. “We know we’re a very capable team, and we just have to make sure that we play every inning as hard as we can and make sure we leave everything on the field.”
Cornell (31-9, 10-2 Ivy) is coming off being swept by Syracuse in twin bill action on Wednesday, a night in which the Red’s bats went ice-cold. The team totaled just nine hits and was shut out in both games, 3-0 and 8-0.

Men’s and Women’s Tennis Begin Ivy League Season Against Columbia This Weekend

After an extremely successful trip to the west coast, men’s tennis begins its Ivy campaign in New York City against Columbia on Saturday. The Red (9-3) is on a seven game winning streak.
In their matchup last year, the Red lost in an extremely tight match, 4-3. However, the team has many more wins this year than it did going into its Ivy season, and their success on the road in Calif. during spring break will to be a big confidence booster against the Ancient Eight.
The women’s team has had the opposite result in both their California sojourn and their preaseason. The women (4-9) are struggling. The team took two straight losses in California after defeating Azusa Pacific University. The Red will host Columbia at home at Reis Tennis center.

W. Lacrosse Drops Two Over Break

The women’s lacrosse team (5-2, 1-1 Ivy) broke its early season winning steak over Spring Break. While on the road for most of the break the Red dropped two of its three matches, beating Columbia before losing to Loyola and Penn.
“We lost two in a row and in similar fashion … but the teams were definitely different. Penn was supremely talented all over the field, and Ivy League is always a big focus for us,” said head coach Jenny Graap ’86. “It hurt that we weren’t playing more strongly.”

Columbia Welcomes W. Lax for Ivy Opener

To kick off Ivy League play, the women’s lacrosse team will travel downstate to “The City that Never Sleeps” to face Columbia University tomorrow for the first game of spring break action. The Red will take the first draw against the Lions at 1 p.m. on Robert K. Kraft Field in New York.