McKenna Named Olympic Assistant Coach

Women’s ice hockey head coach Jodi McKenna has been named an assistant coach for the 2010 U.S. Olympic team, along with Northeastern University head coach Dave Flint. McKenna, who was part of the coaching staff that led the U.S. national team to the gold medal at the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) Women’s World Championship, will help lead the team as it begins its preparations for the Olympics later this month.
The team began its training in the 2009 Hockey Canada Cup in Vancouver, which took place from Aug. 31-Sept. 6. The team will soon head to Blaine, Minn. for the Qwest Tour, which begins Sept. 25. The Tour includes 10 games in nine cities and runs through February 2010. The team will also compete in the 2009 Four Nations Cup, which takes place Nov. 2-8 in Finland, and play three games in Canada against the Canadian national team.
McKenna, a 1998 Brown University graduate, recently finished her second season behind the Cardinals’ bench after serving as an assistant coach for nine years at St. Lawrence. She served as an assistant coach at USA Hockey’s Women’s Under-22 Camp in summer 2008 and at the USA Hockey Women’s Holiday Camp in December of the same year.

Epstein ’12 Wins Gold at World Maccabiah Games

Sam Epstein ’12, who started 35 of 36 games for the Cardinal softball team in 2009, was chosen to represent the U.S. during the 2009 World Maccabiah Games, which were held in Israel in July. The U.S. team went 8-0 in the Games and defeated Argentina 16-0 in the title game to win the gold medal.
Epstein hit .463 during the six-game round-robin schedule, collecting seven safeties in 15 at-bats from the cleanup spot. In a pair of playoff wins over Argentina, Epstein recorded four hits in six at-bats for a .667 average. She drove in eight runs during the eight-game schedule as well, including six during the round-robin phase. Her .463 round-robin average ranked her sixth among all players at the Games, while her six RBI tied her for fourth.
Epstein hit .236 with 21 hits, five doubles, a home run, and 16 RBI for Wesleyan in the spring. Wesleyan went 9-3 in NESCAC West play in 2009 to capture its second straight division crown and reached the NESCAC title game for the second consecutive year as well.

Four Spring Athletes Named Jewish All-American

Four Wesleyan spring athletes were named first-team All-Americans in the July/August edition of the Jewish Sports Review: Talia Bernstein ’11 (softball), Jason Ben-Eliyahu ’09 (men’s lacrosse), Lonny Blumenthal ’10 (men’s lacrosse), and Sarah Orkin ’09 (women’s lacrosse). In addition, Julian Sonnenfeld ’11 (baseball) and Dan Latzman ’09 (men’s lacrosse) were named honorable-mention Jewish All-Americans.
Bernstein, who received first-team all-NESCAC laurels and regional honors from the New England Softball Coaches Association and National Fastpitch Coaches Association, hit .482 with 28 RBI and a team-record 55 hits in 2009. Ben-Eliyahu and Blumenthal helped lead Wesleyan Lax to its first-ever NESCAC title; Ben-Eliyahu tallied 24 goals and 22 assists to rank second on the team with 46 points, while Blumenthal, who was named a New England Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association (NEILA) all-star, recorded 25 goals and nine assists. Orkin, who garnered second-team all-NESCAC honors and was named a first-team United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association (USILA) Berkshire Region all-star, netted 19 goals and eight assists in 2009.
Sonnenfeld, the Cardinals’ starting third baseman, finished second among the team’s regulars with a .364 average. He was named second-team all-NESCAC and a first-team District I CoSIDA/ESPN the Magazine Academic All-American. Latzman tallied 19 goals and eight assists, including an overtime marker to give Wesleyan its first-ever NESCAC tournament win over Middlebury.