ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The 2016 Lobo Ski Team gets things underway on Monday as the apline squad heads to Park City for the University of Utah Invitational. The Lobos, who finished fifth in the NCAA last year, are looking for its second national title of the academic year, and the second in program history as the team won in 2004. The apline events will showcase a veteran women’s squad and a young and inexperienced, but talented men’s squad.
About the 2016 Lobos
The 2016 University of New Mexico Lobos return 12 letter winners from 2015’s squad which finished fifth at the NCAA Championships. The team features plenty of experience on the women’s side with two NCAA titles in Nordic in the form of Emilie Cedervärn in last year’s classical race and Eva Sever Rus in the 2014 freestyle race.
Cedervärn and Sever Rus are the only two All-Americans that return from the 2015 season, but UNM is still plenty deep. While the only other member of the women’s Nordic squad returning is Heleene Tambet, the women’s alpine squad features five returnees from last year, and of those five, Sydney Staples (2015), Sara Ottosson (2015), Karoline Søvik Myklebust (2014) and Courtney Altringer (2014) all have NCAA experience, and Taylor Grauer is ready to make that leap as well in her third season.
Three newcomers in Kati Roivas, Julia Devaux and Brenna Egan will be looking to take the departed Jessica Gnüchtel’s place at the 2016 NCAA championships, while Katharine Irwin is the only addition for the alpine squad.
It’s the men’s side where experience is lacking. Aljaž Praznik is the top Nordic returner, and he qualified for the 2015 NCAAs but was a late scratch due to illness. The rapidly improving Kyle Beling is the only other Lobo with Nordic experience, and they are joined by Austin Huneck and Niklas Rombock.
For Alpine, 2015 NCAA qualifer Carl-Johan Öster returns along with Patrick Brancher, who like Myklebust, missed most of 2015 with an injury. Five talented rookies in Alex Barounos, Rob Greig, Youri Mougel, Tyler Theis and Nick Veth will all have chances to showcase their abilities and qualify for NCAAs.