| FALL 2003... |
PENN STATE ALTOONA SPORTS
Cross Country Coach Doug Hoover Shines at Biathlon World Championships
In his first appearance on the world biathlon stage, Doug Hoover was a smash hit. Penn State Altoona's cross country coach turned in the best individual performance by an American during the Summer Biathlon World Championships in Forni Avoltri, Italy, placing 15th in the Men's 4K Sprint competition on September 10. His one penalty shooting also was the best among the four U.S. competitors.
Hoover finished 1:50.8 behind World Champion Alexander Bilanenko of Ukraine. Bilanenko turned in a perfect score on the shooting range and completed the course in a time of 14:09.2, only 5.1 seconds ahead of Alexsey Kovyazin of Russia, whose shooting also was perfect. Marko Dolenc, of Slovenia, placed third.
 Hoover, who resides in Williamsburg, PA, was one of only two competitors from a Western country to place in the top 15. Devis DeCanal of Italy placed ninth.
"I ran strong through the first leg and then shot clean in the first shooting stage," Hoover recounted. "But, there were a lot of other people doing the same thing at that point, so it was hard to tell where I was in the field. And there were plenty of times earlier in my career when I had shot well early in a race only to fall apart later. So, I just tried to remain calm and focused on the task at hand. After the second shooting stage, when I had only one penalty, I knew that it was a career day and then I emptied the tank on the final running loop."
Hoover, a 1994 Penn State graduate, qualified for the World Championships by winning the 4K Sprint competition at the U.S. Team Trials at the Soldier Hollow Olympic venue outside of Salt Lake City, Utah, in August, the first major title in his biathlon career.
Throughout the past winter and spring, Hoover trained by running 80 miles per week and shooting daily. A veteran of the sport, Hoover had narrowly missed qualifying for the World Championships several times during his seven previous attempts. His successes in Utah and Italy were made all the more sweet by those close calls.
"I had been knocking on the door for a long time," said Hoover, 31. "The competition in the men's field is fierce. So, when I finally qualified for the team, it was one of the greatest moments of my life. Competing so well at my first world championship was just the icing on the cake."
The Summer Biathlon World Championships are held annually. Slovakia and Finland will host the next two championships. The Summer Biathlon is a competition that combines running and shooting. It uses the same format as the Winter Olympic sport, but substitutes running for cross-country skiing. The rifles are .22 caliber and the standard shooting distance is 50 meters.
Hoover's teammates in Italy were Pat Bragassa, of Rigby, ID; Logan Hammer, of Clancy, MT; Marc Sheppard, of West Yellowstone, MT; and Russ Skelton, of Kalispell, MT. A Senior Credit Analyst for Omega Bank, Hoover said that representing the United States in international competition was one of the greatest honors of his life.
"It's also intimidating," he acknowledged. "But, at the same time it gives you a degree of confidence, knowing that you've prepared as well as possible for that moment. As an athlete, I've worked my whole life to get to this level. In seven previous attempts, I failed to make the World Championship Team. So, to finally reach my goal and have the opportunity to represent the United States was an awesome feeling."
Despite reaching the pinnacle in his sport, Hoover does not consider himself an elite athlete.
"Competing on a stage such as the World Championships can be a very humbling experience," he related. "I love to compete and I try to stay focused on what I need to do each day to make myself a better athlete."
In the Men's 6K Mass Start race on September 14, the final day of competition at the World Championships, Hoover placed 24th, third best among the Americans. Hoover incurred five penalties and finished 4:22.2 back of the winner, Bilanenko. Sheppard was 18th and Skelton was 23rd. Bragassa placed 25th.
In his other individual outing, the 6K Pursuit on September 11, Hoover finished 31st, 9:06.3 behind the winner, Kovyazin, of Russia.
In the 4x4K relay on September 13, the U.S. team of Skelton, Hoover, Hammer and Sheppard placed seventh, 5:17.3 behind the winning team from Ukraine. Russia and Slovakia placed second and third, respectively.
Bilanenko, of Ukraine, dominated the World Championships, winning gold medals in the 4K Sprint, 4x4K relay, and 6K Mass Start, and a silver medal in the 6K Pursuit.
Overall, Hoover said he was extremely pleased with his debut at the World Championships.
"Three out of my four races were very good," he said. "I was shooting consistently and running stronger than ever. Mentally, it was very tough to stay relaxed and focused though all of the races. The relay was probably the most stressful because I knew my teammates were depending on me as much as I was on them. I was extremely happy with how well I responded to the pressure of my first World Championship experience and I'm looking forward to future championships."
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Following in the Footsteps of a Legend
Aaron Bowers has something in common with the coaches who followed Vince Lombardi in Green Bay, Bear Bryant at Alabama, and John Wooden at UCLA; they all succeeded legends in their profession.
How many die-hard sports fans, yet alone casual observers of sport, do you think can name the successors of the aforementioned coaching icons? It's likely a very select group. To save you from scurrying to the encyclopedias of football and basketball, the successors were Phil Bengtson in Green Bay, Ray Perkins at Alabama and Gene Bartow at UCLA.
 In his first season as head coach of the Penn State Altoona women's volleyball team, Bowers hopes his name will represent more than the answer to a trivia question in the years to come. In the spring of 2003, Bowers took the reins from Tick Hedrick-Sheaffer whose seemingly endless list of accomplishments included nearly 500 victories, eight State Junior College Championships, 13 Commonwealth Campus titles and eight Western Pennsylvania Conference titles in 27 years of coaching. She was selected Coach of the Year eleven times.
Bowers is very familiar with his predecessor's legacy. He served as Hedrick-Sheaffer's assistant the past five seasons. He regards her remarkable record of success as a blessing rather than a burden.
"There's always pressure to live up to that level of success and keep the program moving forward," Bowers commented. "It's also a great honor for me that I was chosen to succeed Tick. I'm pleased that Tick is still around to help whenever we need her."
Like the retired Wooden at UCLA, Hedrick-Sheaffer has been a staunch supporter of the program she nurtured to prominence, sitting in the heart of the crowd at home matches in the Adler Athletic Complex.
"The program is in good hands," said Hedrick-Sheaffer. "No one knows the game better than Aaron does. He is an excellent strategist with a thorough knowledge of the sport. He was basically my right-hand man. I looked to Aaron for strategy, drills and innovative kinds of things, and he was always quick to respond. He was a great choice to maintain the continuity within the program."
A 2002 Penn State graduate, Bowers has honed his coaching skills by assisting the Central High School boy's volleyball program in Martinsburg and Spring Cove Middle School girl's program, participating in instructional camps and clinics, and serving as a Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association official.
Bowers entered his inaugural season as head coach with a series of priorities.
"My specific goal is for the team to be more aggressive on offense," he remarked. "We mainly relied on defense in the past. Now, we're trying to be more offensive-oriented. We tell the players to hit everything, rather than consistently dink, so we can learn their ranges."
"We're also trying to recruit more four-year players, so we won't experience the turnover with sophomore transfers every year. This season, we had only six returning players. That's a small number. It was a good core group to start with, but we need more juniors and seniors."
When asked about his style of coaching, Bowers stated that he definitely is not a "yeller and screamer."
"That gets on the players nerves and they start to block you out," Bowers said. "I try to be more of a teacher."
While his transition from assistant to head coach has required devoting considerably more time to administrative tasks, the primary source of joy that Bowers finds in coaching still is the basic interaction with the players on the court.
"It has been a lot of fun. I love it," he said. "I'm happiest when I'm in the gym. There are times when you have to buckle down and work hard, but most of the time, it's pure enjoyment."
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Penn State Altoona Hosts First Cross Country Meet
A Herculean effort by cross country coach Doug Hoover and members of the Penn State Altoona Varsity Athletics staff resulted in a tremendously successful meet for more than 400 high school and collegiate competitors in late September. The first-ever Lion Invitational at historic Fort Roberdeau in Sinking Valley drew praise from competitors, coaches and spectators alike.
"It is great to be able to host a meet," Hoover said. "We had 338 high school athletes plus coaches, parents, and other fans in attendance. So, it was a chance for us to showcase our program to the public, as well as provide a quality competitive experience for our student-athletes without traveling."
Preparing the course for the meet required considerable physical labor, particularly during the 72 hours prior to the meet.
"The facilities at Fort Roberdeau were terrific for hosting the event," Hoover stated. "But there was a lot of mowing, trimming, and landscaping that had to be done in the weeks prior to the event. In the three days prior to the race, we put five truckloads of mulch down on the nature trails with the help of the Blair County Highway Department."
Penn State Altoona placed second behind Juniata in both the men's and women's competition. Pitt-Greensburg, Pitt-Bradford and Mount Aloysius rounded out the field. Top fifteen placers for the Lions were Jessica Hughes (7th), Jessica Silay (9th), and Alison Lentz (15th) in the women's 6K race and Michael Misselwitz (6th), Christian Schmidt (7th), Patrick Gould (11th), Jeremy Flinn (12th) and Brandon Allison (14th) in the men's 8K race.
"This was a moderately challenging course with some technical climbing through the woods," Hoover said. "We got a lot of positive feedback on the course, as it was spectator-friendly and fair to all of the athletes."
Twenty-nine high schools were represented in the Lion Invitational. Central Cambria won the high school girls meet and Baldwin won the high school boys meet. The course length for both races was 5000 meters.
From a logistical standpoint, Hoover said he was very pleased overall with the execution of the event.
"But, there's always room for improvement," he commented. "This was an educational experience for a lot of the people involved. Right after the event was over, everyone started talking about how we could improve the event for next year."
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Penn State Altoona Men's Golf Team Victorious
Identical team scores of 317 and top 12 showings by its top four scorers carried the Penn State Altoona men's golf team to victory in two of its most important tournaments of the fall: the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference Championships and Eastern College Athletic Conference Division III Southern Qualifier.
Penn State Altoona captured its first AMCC Men's Golf Championship with a 12-stroke advantage over second-place Penn State Behrend on October 6 at the Wildwood Golf Club in McCandless, PA. Kevin Lazzaro of the Lions tied for the individual title with a 75. Penn State Altoona's Justin Miller (76) placed third, and Geoff Smock (83) and Troy Monahan (83) finished in a three-way tie for 12th.
Penn State Altoona's triumph in the ECAC Qualifier on September 25 at Penn State's Blue Course at University Park, PA, was decided by a tiebreaker: the fifth individual score. Tied with Pitt-Greensburg in the final team standings, Penn State Altoona claimed the tournament trophy and a bid to the ECAC Division III Championships by virtue of Lazzaro's one-stroke edge over Robert Statler of Pitt-Greensburg. Individually, Smock (74) and Miller (77) tied for second and sixth, respectively. Anthony Falcone (83) and Monahan (83) finished in a five-way tie for 12th.
At the ECAC Division III Championships October 4-5 at Saratoga Springs, NY, Penn State Altoona placed 12th in the 18-team field. Miller (83-79—162), the top placer for the Lions, finished in a six-way tie for 28th. Also scoring for Penn State Altoona were Lazzaro (T37th, 164), Monahan (T41st, 165), and Smock (T68th, 171).
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