The Lewis & Clark College Department of PE & Athletics is preparing to welcome in a class of talented first-year student athletes. With more students committing to Pioneer athletics every day, the Pioneers already have 102 recruited student-athletes who have paid deposits to attend the school in the fall. This is over a 100% increase above the number of new student-athletes that arrived on Palatine Hill last fall. In addition to these 54 female and 48 male recruits, there are another 70 non-recruited students who will also be attending the College who have expressed an interest in participating in one of the Pioneers’ 19 varsity sports.

The incoming student-athletes have a very impressive academic and athletic profile and come from 28 different states and the District of Columbia. Among the 102 recruited athletes, there are eight valedictorians and thirteen with a 4.0 GPA. On average, this group is in the upper 20% of their class, has a grade point average of 3.6 and scored nearly 1280 on the SAT.

The student-athletes have collectively earned 47 first team all-league, 11 second team all-league, and 27 all-district honors. They also have 12 all-state designations, 11 conference MVP awards. 17 received scholar-athlete awards. In a leadership role, the incoming class has 43 terms as team captain and 25 team MVP’s among them.

The crew team does much of their building from within, drawing from the novice team to fill voids on the varsity squad. This year, they have ten incoming recruited student-athletes they believe will help continue building on the past successes of the crew teams.

Roseville area’s Emily Vaughn of St. Paul, Minn. has been rowing for three years with the Minneapolis Area Rowing Club, competing last year in a 4+ at the Head of the Charles regatta. Buffalo, N.Y.’s Margaret Mahoney was the coxswain and team captain at City Honors School. Her boats have medaled at the NY State Championships. Sarah Jackson from La Jolla High rowed for the ZLAC Rowing Club in San Diego for the past four years, competing at Nationals last year. Piedmont High’s Maggie Hennessey rowed for the Oakland Strokes Rowing Club for four years, being named the Most Improved Rower in 2003. Eli Fabens of Ithaca, NY rowed fro the Cacadilla Boat Club, serving as team captain in 06-07. Ruthie Ditzler was accepted to Lewis & Clark last year, but deferred her enrollment in order to spend a year in Antigua, Guatemala. She is from Seattle, having rowed for Mt. Baker Crew. Katherine Dahlhausen from Cleveland Heights, Ohio rowed for the Cleveland Scholastic Rowing Association for four years while attending Hathaway Brown School. Molly Anderson, from Winchester, Mass., attended Cambridge School of Weston and rowed fro Community Rowing, Inc. Jessica Asbridge from Snohomish, Wash. Rowed for the Everett Rowing Association. She rowed there all of high school and is transferring from Bucknell University where she also rowed for a short amount of time.