VALLEY CITY, N.D. (vcsuvikings.com) – The Valley City State University athletic department recognized excellence in its student-athletes Monday night at the 2021 Viking Awards.
The annual banquet brings together most of the university’s student-athletes for a meal, awards and recognition of their accomplishments during the 2020-21 season. This year’s celebration was held outdoors at VCSU’s Lokken Stadium, and students were served a tailgate-style meal prepared by members of the VCSU Century Club Board of Directors.
Athletic director Jill DeVries emceed the event as VCSU announced its major athletic awards, honored its seniors and North Star Champions of Character, and celebrated numerous school record breakers during the night.
VALLEY CITY, N.D. (vcsuvikings.com) – Jorun Hamre broke the single-season home run record Sunday as the Valley City State baseball team completed a four-game sweep against Presentation College.
Hamre hit his 15th home run of the season in game one, breaking the VCSU record of 14 held by Bryan Swaenepoel (2001) and Stacy Fitterer (1989). Hamre’s blast highlighted a 5-4 victory in game one Sunday. In game two, Reed Butz pitched six shutout innings and the Vikings closed the series with a 10-0 win.
VCSU outscored Presentation College 51-17 over the four-game series. Valley City State is now 21-24 overall and finished 14-9 in conference play. Valley City State clinched the No. 3 seed for the NSAA Conference Tournament starting Friday in Valley City. The Vikings will face No. 4 seed Waldorf University in the first round, Friday at 5:30 p.m.
FARGO, N.D. (NewsDakota.com) – Jake Malec’s one-out, two-run home run in the bottom of the 11th inning lifted the North Dakota State Bison to a 5-3 win over Valley City State Tuesday night at Newman Outdoor Field in Fargo. It was the 75th meeting between the two schools and the first since 2017.
Jack Simonson led off the eleventh with a single. Calen Schwabe tried to bunt him over, but his bunt was too hard and pitcher Matthew Suda was able to field the ball and throw Simonson out at second. But the relay was not in time to get Schwabe. Then Schwabe moved to second base when Suda tried to pick him off, but his high throw went off the glove of first baseman Jorun Hamre and into foul territory to advance Schwabe. Then Malec skied a uda pitch high into the night twilight sky, right fielder Dustin Mertz could not pck up the ball right away, but it wouldn’t have matter. Malec shot clear the right field fence for the game winning home run. t was Malec’s seventh of the season.
VALLEY CITY, N.D. (vcsuvikings.com) – Valley City State University won two games in walk-off fashion on Saturday as the Viking baseball team hosted Waldorf University for a rare tripleheader.
The Vikings won game one 2-1 on a walk-off two-run double from JT Reed, and then won game three 7-6 after an extra-inning walk-off sacrifice fly by David Demeter. Waldorf won game two by a score of 5-2.
With the pair of wins, the Vikings are now 17-23 overall and 10-9 in conference play. Waldorf moves to 19-24 overall and 12-11 in the NSAA.
Matthew Suda picked up both wins on the mound for VCSU after making two scoreless relief appearances.