ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — All you needed to know about the 2016 Ski Team season was to look at the photo of the student-athletes being presented their lettermen’s jackets after their first year of competition. Twelve of the 23 on the team walked up … more than half. Of those seven qualified for NCAAs this year.
That young squad, which despite using seven NCAA newcomers still finished sixth in the NCAA Championships, celebrated the season with the annual awards banquet, hosted at the Hotel Albuquerque in conjunction with the Ultimate Ski & Snowboard Challenge.
MVPs were awarded in all four disciplines, with Courtney Altringer, one of the teams’ three seniors, winning the women’s alpine MVP award. She was also a tri-MVP in 2014. On the men’s side, Rob Greig earned the honor in his first season after an All-American finish in the giant slalom.
For Nordic, not much of a surprise that all three women that comprised the first group in school history to all earn All-America status in the same event (Nordic Classical) were named Tri-MVPs. For Emilie Cedervärn, it’s her second straight honor, and for Eva Sever Rus, it’s her second as well after earning the honor in 2014. Kati Roivas, a freshman, was the other Nordic honored after finishing second in the Classical at NCAAs.
The men’s Nordic MVP honor went to a rookie as well in Austin Huneck, who was UNM’s most consistent men’s Nordic all season, including NCAAs.
Madison Warren from the Alumni Lettermen’s Association presented new letter jackets to Youri Mougel, Tyler Theis (NCAA), Rob Greig (NCAA), Alex Barounos, Niklas Rombock (NCAA), Austin Huneck (NCAA), Nick Veth, Katharine Irwin (NCAA), Julia Devaux, Petteri Vaherkoski (NCAA), Brenna Egan and Kati Roivas (NCAA).
“It was a down year for us in terms of the NCAA finishing sixth,” said head coach Fredrik Landstedt, “But you can see how bright the future looks when you see all those NCAA participants getting their letter jackets for their first year.”
The banquet ended with the awarding of the Patricia A. Abruzzo and Ben L. Abruzzo Scholarship Winners. Taylor Grauer was the winner of the Patricia A. Abruzzo Scholarship and Carl-Johan Öster, who will graduate but stay on as an assistant coach next year, was the winner of the Ben L. Abruzzo Scholarship.
Plenty of Winners at 2016 End of Season Ski Team Banquet
