At the completion of the winter season, New Paltz athletic teams are third in the SUNYAC Commissioner’s Cup standings.
“This is the highest the school has ever been,” said the tennis team’s Coach Rob Bruley. “It’s based on how well you do in your sport and it also works on percentages because we don’t participate in every sport, so it’s worked on the percentages of sports that you do play in.”
Last year, New Paltz landed the sixth place spot after all three seasons. The program had a total of 79 points with an average of 5.64 points per sport. As of right now, New Paltz has 72.5 points while averaging 6.59 points per sport.
Teams are given points based on how well they do in their sport during the regular season and the post-season. Teams that finish first in their sport are given 10 points while the school that finishes in second is given nine points, the team that finishes third is given eight points and so on. The teams are then given points based on post-season finishes and these scores are then divided by two and the final number is the amount of points that the team receives towards the standings.
New Paltz’s current position in the Cup standings can be attributed to the success that many of the school’s athletic programs have had within the past year.
“We’ve had a very successful fall season and then that continued on in the winter with both the Men’s and Women’s Basketball teams and Women’s Swimming as well,” said Bruley.
This past year has seen a surge in New Paltz sports as they have become a force to be reckoned with by other schools in the SUNYAC. The tennis team took home the SUNYAC title while Women’s Volleyball went to the conference finals at the conclusion of the fall season. Both Women’s and Men’s Basketball made it to their respective tournaments, with the Women’s squad making it to the Final Four before falling to SUNY Oneonta. Women’s Swimming had a “tremendous” second place finish while the men’s team finished as the third-place team in their finals.
The Hawks trail behind SUNY Geneseo, who currently averages 8.25 points per sport and SUNY Cortland, who averages 7.46 points per sport, respectively. New Paltz will compete for the standing now with baseball, softball, tennis and lacrosse.