The search began after Director of Athletics Mike Waddell accepted a new position as the Senior Assistant Athletic Director at the University of Arkansas.

The committee is made up of 13 different people from both on and off campus. Greater Baltimore Committee President and CEO Donald Fry will lead the search committee.

Fry currently serves as chairman of the Tiger Club Advisory Board. Other members of the committee include Men’s Basketball head coach Pat Skerry and Women’s Lacrosse head coach Sonia LaMonica.

According to a release sent out by the University on Monday, the committee hopes to have a new Director of Athletics named by the start of the fall 2013 semester.

The Towerlight will update this as more information becomes available.

With the win, the Tigers (29-28) receive an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament. The 64-team field will be announced Monday on ESPNU.

“With everything that happened, it’s a feeling of establishing our worth, that the program is worth having, that maybe people made a mistake with the idea of permanently dropping baseball,” Head Coach Mike Gottlieb said. “We are competitive and maybe we are an asset to the university than a burden.”

The Tigers (29-28) relied on senior pitcher Mike Volpe, who pitched a complete game and allowed only two runs on seven hits against the Tribe (37-22). He only walked two batters and struck out six.

Volpe pitched Saturday’s game on just two days of rest. It was also the first complete game of his career.

“When people ask me five, 10 years from now about this team and what it took, I’ll tell them about a guy named Mike Volpe who for the first three years was just a role player,” Gottlieb said. “He had a real good regular season for us and then in the biggest game of his life, he had the best game of his life. That’s a pretty rare guy.”

Junior designated hitter Kurt Wertz provided the spark offensively for the Tigers. Wertz went 2-for-4 and drove in three runs, including a two-run RBI triple in the top of the ninth inning. Wertz also hit a home run in the first inning of the game, his 13th of the season.

For the tournament, Wertz batted .412 with six RBI. He, along with Volpe, senior catcher Andrew Parker and junior outfielder Dominic Fratantuono were all named to the CAA Championship All-Tournament team.

Parker batted .538 in the tournament, hit two home runs and drove in six runs. Fratantuono batted .600, hit two home runs and drove in seven runs.

“I told the team before we left last Monday I said, ‘We’re capable of winning this, so a number of people are going to have to step up.’ Guys like Wertz, Dom and Parker have been big-time guys for us this year, and Fisher,” Gottlieb said.

Gottlieb said players such as Kyle Paul stepped up and helped the team win. Paul earned a save in the Tigers’ 9-8 win over Northeastern in the first game of the CAA Tournament and then earned the win the next day against UNC Wilmington.

However, the tournament’s Most Valuable Player Award was awarded to graduate infielder Zach Fisher. Fisher batted .476, hit three home runs and drove in 10 runs.

“I mean it’s cool but all that matters is the championship,” Fisher said when asked what it meant to him to win MVP. “I’m glad that what I did to win that award helped us win the championship.”

Saturday’s Championship game got off to a fast-paced start.

After Wertz homered in the first inning, the Tribe tied the game at one as second baseman Ryan Lindemuth hit a RBI single to center field that drove in centerfielder Ryan Brown.

The Tigers wasted no time in responding, as Fratantuono led off the second inning with a solo home run of his own to give Towson a 2-1 advantage.

The score would remain the same until the bottom of the fourth inning when leftfielder Jonathan Sarty singled to left and drove in Lindemuth.

Once again, Towson wasted little time in recapturing the lead. In the top of the fifth inning, Fisher singled up the middle and drove in junior outfielder/pitcher Brandon Gonnella.

Volpe would shut out William & Mary the rest of the way and Wertz’s two-run triple in the ninth sealed the championship.

With one out in the bottom of the ninth, Volpe got designated hitter Jackson Shaver to ground out to junior shortstop Hunter Bennett, who threw the ball to junior second baseman Pat Fitzgerald who then threw it to sophomore first baseman Brendon Butler for the game-winning double play.

It was Towson’s 79th double play of the season, the most in NCAA Division I this season.

“It seemed fitting because of how many we were able to turn all year,” Bennett said of the game-winning play. “I couldn’t imagine a better way to win the conference championship.”

As a team, the Tigers batted .406 and scored 47 runs in the tournament. They had 12 doubles, four triples and 11 homers.

Towson will now prepare for its first NCAA Tournament appearance since 1991. Monday’s selection show is scheduled for noon.

“In a relatively short amount of time, Mike Waddell began an impressive transformation of Towson University’s NCAA Division I Intercollegiate athletics program,” University President Maravene Loeschke said in the statement.

Waddell will officially step down from his position on June 4, according the statement, and an interim director of athletics has not been announced.

However, the statement said a search for a new permanent AD will begin immediately.

Original story: 

Towson University Director of Athletics Mike Waddell has accepted a new position at the University of Arkansas as the Senior Associate Director of Athletics, according to the Arkansas Athletic Department.

Waddell leaves Towson after serving as Director of Athletics for just under three years.

“I am excited to join the Arkansas Razorback Family and to work with the outstanding student-athletes, coaches, administration and staff at the University of Arkansas,” Waddell said in a statement to Arkansas. “The opportunity to work with a program that has a rich, long-standing tradition and for an athletics director in Jeff Long who has proven to be one of the most innovative and proactive in all of college athletics is something that I am eager to engage.”

Waddell could not be reached for comment as of Monday evening.

“Michael is a tremendous addition to our administrative team and will provide Razorback Athletics an informed perspective to help our program capitalize on the valuable exposure opportunities we will have moving forward,” Arkansas Director of Athletics Jeff Long said in a release on Monday.

Despite bringing Towson six Colonial Athletic Association Championships in his tenure, Waddell had recently come under fire when it was announced the school would be cutting the men’s soccer and baseball programs.

While an agreement was reached with Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley to keeping funding the baseball team for an extra season, men’s soccer was still cut.

The Towerlight will update this story as more information becomes available.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Phi Mu sister Kelsey Rock was awarded Greek Council President of the Year for her work with the Panhellenic Association, a group of 10 different sorority chapters on campus.

“I am very excited and honored for the award,” Rock said. “I kept good relationships with all the [Greek] presidents, made sure I was respected among them and did what I needed to make them happy.”

Rock’s biggest responsibility was to represent her sorority and Towson Greek Life as a whole in a positive way.

“I also worked with Circle of Sisterhood,” Rock said. “It’s a cause started by a sorority woman which helps girls in third world countries get an education. Every girl who goes through our recruitments and is accepted into our sorority, a $5 donation goes towards that cause.”

Phi Mu also won two other awards for Chapter Assessment and Executive Board.

The Executive Board of the Year Award shows the hard work the sorority has done by organizing its sisters to go personal sorority events as well as other campus events and completing their study hours.

The Chapter Assessment Award showed that Phi Mu behaved correctly on campus by not receiving any probations and consistently remaining on good terms for the school year. They also accumulated points by supporting other groups and their campus involvement.

Currently Phi Mu has 113 sisters in its chapter.

This is exactly how I feel about the relationship between ESPN and LeBron James and Stephen Curry.

I was on Twitter while watching the NBA playoffs Friday night, and I was getting sick from all the mush that was flowing from ESPN to James and Curry.

Here are just a few examples of the lovey-dovey tweets sent out, showing nothing but favoritism for the Miami Heat and Golden State Warriors, James and Curry’s teams.

“CAN YOU SPEAK UP? WE CAN’T HEAR YOU OVER THE @WARRIORS CROWD.”

“It got out of hand early, but the Heat have this series…”

“Remember when people used to say LeBron can’t close?”

Not to mention that the second tweet came complete of a picture of James back-dropped by flames with the words “Back in Control.”

Now, I’m not bitter about this just because I’m a Washington Wizards fan and they’re terrible. I’m upset because ESPN, as a media source, is supposed to be un-biased, and in their broadcast and social media posts, they are showing a clear favoritism toward the Heat and Warriors, specifically their two stars.

On SportsCenter the Chicago Bulls, Miami’s opponent, have been made out to be these villains who must play dirty basketball, while the Heat are these innocent children who are just trying to have fun.

I know there are other media outlets that are at fault of doing this in the past, but these NBA playoffs have been one of the most egregious cases on ESPN.

This would be a completely different story if one of ESPN’s personalities were tweeting these things. Everyone knows Bob Ryan is a Boston sports fan, and therefore he can tweet whatever he wants about the Celtics.

However, ESPN is an international corporation, no just one person. They need to show balance. People turn to ESPN to get the sports news and reaction, not which team the person that runs the worldwide leader’s social media accounts think has the best crowd.

If the Miami World Herald wants to tweet out a picture of James after the Heat’s win, that’s fine. It’s the team that the paper covers.

ESPN does not cover one particular team. Instead of these overzealous tweets and Facebook posts, fans should expect updates such as SportsCenter’s tweet that read “C’EST MAGNIFIQUE! Tony Parker has 25 Pts, 4 Reb and 3 Ast at halftime. Spurs lead Warriors, 57-48.”

That is an actual update that provides news. Not just hype tweets that people who only root for those teams care about.

The worst part about all this is that no one actually cares. ESPN has such a stranglehold on the sports media that no matter how many fans like myself are out there to complain, there are five fans in Oakland who are stoked to see their team all over ESPN.

It’s not like ESPN is going to lose in the ratings anytime soon, they have the NBA playoffs on their channel. But maybe if the social media manager for ESPN is looking at this he/she might tone it down on the LeBron love for a little bit.

With the win on Sunday, the Dukes took the series from the Tigers (23-27, 12-12 CAA) 2-1.

Towson won the first game of the series 11-7 but lost the second game 16-3.

“It’s heartbreaking but that’s baseball,” junior outfielder Dominic Fratantuono said of the loss after the game.

Towson got off to an early lead in Sunday’s rubber match when sophomore outfielder Peter Bowles hit a runner-batted-in single that scored junior second baseman Pat Fitzgerald in the first inning.

Bowles would add to Towson’s lead in the third inning with a two-run homer in the top of the inning that brought home junior designated hitter Kurt Wertz.

Junior pitcher Brandon Gonnella held James Madison scoreless until the bottom of the sixth inning.

The Dukes hit two RBI doubles, one from Roberts and another from second baseman Conner Brown, that tied the game up at three runs apiece.

The Tigers regained the lead in the top of the seventh inning as Fratantuono hit a two-run homer to give his team a 5-3 lead.

But, the Dukes added three more runs in the bottom half of the inning to retake the lead at 6-5.

Pinch hitter Tyler Gregory started the scoring with a home run to right centerfield.

Roberts then tied the game up with an RBI single before shortstop Casey Goss grounded out to second base and allowed first baseman Ty McFarland to reach home.

After a scoreless eighth inning for both teams, the Tigers were left to their final three outs down by a run.

In the first at-bat of the inning, Wertz tied the game at six with a solo home run to right field.

Four batters later, with the bases loaded, sophomore first baseman Brendan Butler reached first base on a fielder’s choice and allowed Bowles to give the Tigers a 7-6 lead.

James Madison got out of the inning after sophomore outfielder Richie Blosser grounded out.

With one out in the bottom half of the final inning, Nowottnick walked McFarland before giving up the game-winning home run to Roberts in the next at-bat.

Gonnella finished the game with 6.1 innings pitched and gave up six earned runs off of 10 hits. However, he managed to strike out six batters.

Roberts finished the game 3-5 with four RBIs and two runs scored for the Dukes.

Wertz led the Tigers as he went a perfect 5-5 at the plate with one RBI and crossed home plate three times.

Towson now finds itself with only three games left to reposition itself in the conference standings as the Colonial Athletic Association Tournament approaches.

Towson currently sits in sixth place in the CAA, and only the top six teams make the conference tournament.

The Tigers will conclude the regular season with a three-game series at home starting Thursday against Northeastern.

“We’re going to finish the regular season strong and roll into the playoffs,” Fratantuono said.

Thursday’s game is set to start at 3:30 p.m.

“We prepared the same way we did each game of the tournament,” shortstop Hailey Balk said. “We were playing each like it was our last.”

The Dukes took an early lead in the first inning, scoring two runs off a single by utility player Erica Field.

Pressure against the Tigers continued in the second inning after Duke outfielder Morgan Heath singled to right field and gave them a 3-0 advantage.

The Tigers quickly retaliated in the bottom of the second inning when Duke pitcher Jailyn Ford hit senior first basemen Bina Abbott with a wild pitch to put her on first.

Abbott then advanced to second after Ford walked junior outfielder Maureen Hepner. With a single to center field, senior outfielder Kelli Lyons brought in Abbott to give the Tigers their first run of the game.

Tiger senior pitcher Katie Lingmai was tested when the Dukes’ third baseman, Sarah Mooney, hit a powerful homerun in right center field, adding another run to the Dukes score.

Lingmai then threw a wild pitch that allowed Ford to score and put the Dukes up 5-1.

In the top of the fourth inning, Mooney hit another homerun off of Lingmai down the left field line, giving the Dukes a large lead at 7-1.

Mooney went 2 for 4 at the plate with two homers, three runs batted in, and three runs scored.

Over the next three innings, both teams struggled offensively, as no runs were scored.

Eager for a hit, with one out in the top of the seventh inning, Ford homered off of Lingmai to right center, putting up the last run of the game.

The Tigers completed the game with hits from Balk and sophomore infielder Macie McGeehan.

“I am so proud of this team and all we have accomplished,” Balk said. “We really turned things around this season.”

With a phenomenal performance for the 2013 season, Lingmai ends her career with an 18-win season and holds the first place position on the all-time wins list in Towson history.

The Tigers also end the season with two players receiving post-season honors at the CAA awards banquet.

Dunham was named to the Second-Team All Colonial Athletic Association Team.

She led the team with a batting average of .311, six home runs, and 41 runs batted in.

Freshman outfielder Olivia Yarborough was given All-Rookie notice from the league. She has eight stolen bases in just 10 attempts.

Both Dunham and Yarborough where the only two Tigers to start every game this season.

“We have a lot of new talent coming in and I know they’re going to help us improve and fill in the gaps,” Balk said. “There’s good vibes in the end of this season and hopefully it’ll carry over to next year.”

The first guy to eat 10 hot dogs with buns won, and for the girls, the first to eat six won. Girls could enter as a team of two, each eating three hot dogs with buns. The hot dogs were supplied by Black and Gold, the on-campus catering service.

The contest was open to the general public, not just Greek Life. Most sororities entered one team of girls each, according to Marcus.

Lambda Chi fraternity had several entrants sign up for the contest.

“This proved to be helpful for them since one of their entrants won the contest,” Marcus said.

Ben Carroll, a Lambda Chi brother won for the second year in a row for the guys, beating his own record from last year. For the girls, Riley Mace and Bree Nolan from Alpha Omicron Pi took first place giving the ladies of AOPi their third championship, according to Marcus.

Marcus said he believes the best part of the event was the result.

All of the money raised will be donated to AEPi’s philanthropy, Save a Child’s Heart.

“While it is entertaining watching all the contestants gorge themselves faster than any human should, it gives me the most pleasure knowing that we are able to help people that truly need it,” Marcus said.

There were also raffles for different prizes such as a Qdoba gift card, a Starbucks gift card, Baltimore Orioles tickets and Washington Capitals prize packs. There was also a raffle for the brothers of AEPi to clean your entire apartment once next semester.

“We had a few people get lucky enough to win multiple prizes, so everyone was enjoying themselves during the actual event,” Marcus said.

So, this is my last Greek this Week column for the semester. I hope you enjoyed reading it, and a big thanks to everyone who contributed.

Rachel Candela/ The Towerlight

The mathematics tutoring center has been renamed to honor the late Devin Spence, a Towson alumnus who was killed in a car accident this past February.

Announced formally at the Academic Achievement Center’s 9th Annual Tutor awards ceremony held on Wednesday, the center will be known as the Spence Mathematics Tutoring Lab.

“It was the right thing to do,” Math Coordinator for the Achievement Center Jeremy Boettinger said.

Spence graduated from Towson in 2012 and died after his car collided with a bus. Spence had spent three years at the achievement center as a math tutor and after graduation became a math teacher for Manchester Valley High School in Carroll County.

“He had a natural ability to help students to reach their goals,” Boettinger said.

Boettinger said that, in addition to renaming the tutoring center, a plaque with a photo of Spence and biography would be put on display at the lab.

“He definitely deserves it,” Senior Travis Travis, a tutor honored at the ceremony, said.  “It’s a big commitment to be a tutor for three years.”

Jennifer Wendt, the learning specialist at the Achievement Center, said she was very excited about the renaming.

“It’s an incredible presentation of what Devin represents,” she said.