NSU sweeps Freshman of the Year awards, earns Women’s Swimmer and Men’s Coach of the Year honors
MELBOURNE, Fla. – After a strong finish at the 2019 NCAA National Championships, the Nova Southeastern University swim programs earned a four Sunshine State Conference individual awards, including Freshman of the Year on both the men’s and women’s sides, Women’s Swimmer of the Year and Men’s Coach of the Year. Sasha Maslova and Alessandro Xella swept the rookie awards, while Emma Sundstedt earned her second-consecutive SSC individual award and head coach Ben Hewitt brought home his third overall Coach of the Year laurel.
With four individual awards, the 2018-19 Sharks tie the program-high set in 2015 when Anton Lobanov and Bryndis Hansen earned Freshman of the Year honors, Thiago Sickert was named Men’s Swimmer of the Year and Hollie Bonewit-Cron was Women’s Coach of the Year.
“What’s perhaps most exciting about all these accolades, is that its speaks not only to our culture, but to our future,” boasted Hewitt. “It’s a young team just discovering its true potential.”
Maslova becomes the third Shark to earn SSC Women’s Swimming Freshman of the Year honors. The Moscow, Russia native set the conference overall record this season in the 200 butterfly (1:58.65) as well as the meet record in the 400 IM (4:16.21) at the 2019 conference championship. Along with those two events, she also posted an SSC meet win in the 200 IM and a sixth place finish in the 200 breast. At nationals, Maslova’s top race was a fourth place finish in the 200 fly. She also posted an eighth place finish in the 400 IM and 12th place finish in the 200 IM.
“Sasha learned quickly, overcoming so much in a very short period of time,” commented Hewitt. “She hit the ground the running and really found her stride at the conference championship and maintained some strong performances at NCAA’s. Setting a school, one conference overall record and two meet records in her second meet as a Shark was a brilliant performance.”
Xella is the third swimmer from Nova Southeastern to earn Men’s Freshman of the Year honors, first since 2015, after competing in three events for the Sharks during the 2019 NCAA Division II National Championship. The Imola, Italy product finished 11th in the 400 IM, 28th in the 200 IM, and 30th in the 200 backstroke at nationals. Xella was also selected Second Team All-SSC following 48 points at the SSC meet.
“Alessandro was a work horse all year, finding his best swims at just the right time,” explained Hewitt. “He is an instrumental member of our IM core which puts up some outstanding efforts in practice daily. Seeing him put together his best 400 IM of the year at NCAA’s was special.”
Sundstedt is the fourth athlete from Nova Southeastern, third consecutive, to be named SSC Women’s Swimmer of the Year. At this year’s NCAA Championship meet, the sophomore earned four individual All-American honors with her finishes in the 500 free (second), 1000 free (third), 1650 free (third) and 200 free (fourth). She was also named SSC Swimmer of the Meet following 77 points in the league championship, with the majority coming from wins in the 500 Free, 1000 Free, and the 1650 Free with a time of 16:37.53 that stands as a new meet record. The Hasselby, Sweden product joins Florida Southern’s Alli Crenshaw as the only athletes to win both SSC Swimmer and Freshman of the Year during their career.
“Emma’s persistence and her desire to improve upon last year’s season was clear all year long,” boasted Hewitt. “Finishing in the Top-4 in every event in NCAA’s is rarely seen, even at this level. She was on a mission to put away her disappointment from last year’s NCAA’s, staying present and focused every step.”
Hewitt has been selected SSC Coach of the Year by his peers after securing a conference championship and an SSC-best 12th place finish among 32 scoring teams at the national championship. Hewitt brings the award back to Nova Southeastern for the first time since the program won the inaugural honor in 2011.
“I am humbled to be recognized by my peers in receiving this award,” said Hewitt. “I definitely want to thank Lindsay Craig, Rita Koryukova, Franco Lupoli and Daniel Murphy for all that they did to contribute to our success. Their hard work, dedication, loyalty and passion for the program has been routinely recognized by our peers and is reflected in this honor. We aren’t sitting here today without them. It’s great to win a coach of the year award, but at the end of the day, I’m here because I was fortunate to have brought in some outstanding athletes and great coaches.”
###
Be sure to sign up for NSU’s RSS feed so you don’t miss any of our news releases, guest editorials and other announcements. Please sign up HERE.
About Nova Southeastern University (NSU): Located in beautiful Fort Lauderdale, Florida, NSU is ranked among U.S. News & World Report’s Top 200 National Research Universities and is a dynamic, private research university providing high-quality educational and research programs at the undergraduate, graduate, and first-professional degree levels. Established in 1964, NSU now includes 16 colleges, the 215,000-square-foot Center for Collaborative Research, a private JK-12 grade school, the Mailman Segal Center for Human Development with specialists in Autism, the world-class NSU Art Museum Fort Lauderdale, and the Alvin Sherman Library, Research and Information Technology Center, which is Florida’s largest public library. NSU has campuses in Fort Lauderdale, Fort Myers, Jacksonville, Miami, Miramar, Orlando, Palm Beach, and Tampa, Florida, as well as San Juan, Puerto Rico, while maintaining a presence online globally. Classified as a research university with “high research activity” by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, NSU is one of only 50 universities nationwide to also be awarded Carnegie’s Community Engagement Classification, and is also the largest private institution in the United States that meets the U.S. Department of Education’s criteria as a Hispanic-serving Institution. For more information, please visit http://www.nova.edu/.
March 28, 2019
Morgan Shattuck, Athletic Communications Coordinator
954-275-2694
mshattuck@nova.edu
