BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Junior Vera Sjöberg of the Boston University women’s track & field and cross country teams was named the Patriot League Women’s Scholar-Athlete of the Year, the league announced Wednesday.
 

The Stockholm, Sweden native won three individual Scholar-Athlete of the Year honors during the season, earning one in each of the cross country, indoor track & field and outdoor track & field seasons. She was also named to the Academic All-Patriot League Team in each season and won a major award from the league for her athletic accomplishments.
 
“I am so proud of Vera for earning Patriot League Scholar-Athlete of the Year,” said Grant Cartwright, Boston University’s Director of Track and Field and Cross Country. “Her resume of work in the Patriot League is historic on both the conference and national levels. She has accomplished all this while being an excellent scholar. She is a true role model and a shining example of the type of person we want representing Boston University.”
 
Sjöberg earned her bachelor’s degree in just three years on Comm. Ave, finishing with a 3.97 GPA as an English major with a minor in women, gender and sexuality. She was named to the Dean’s List six times and has won five total Patriot League Scholar-Athlete of the Year honors, with two coming during the 2023-24 academic year.
 
During the cross country season, Sjöberg was the individual champion at the PL Cross Country Championships and earned Runner of the Meet honors. She went on to finish seventh at the NCAA Northeast Regional, earning All-Region status and advancing to the NCAA Cross Country Championships. She took 42^nd at that meet, just two spots shy of All-American status.
 
At the Patriot League Indoor Championships, Sjöberg dominated, winning the mile, 3000m and 5000m, leading for every single lap she raced. The Swede earned Patriot League Track Athlete of the Meet and Highest Point Scorer honors. Sjöberg also became the first BU woman to qualify for the NCAA Indoor Championships since 2014, as she finished eighth in the mile and was named First Team All-American.
 
Once she shifted to the outdoor season, her reign over the League continued, as she won the 1500m and 5000m at the Patriot League Championships, with meet records in both, and contributed to BU’s school record-breaking 4x800m gold medal win. Sjöberg once again snagged Track Athlete of the Meet honors and at the NCAA Outdoor Championships, she became the first woman in League and BU history to double, racing in both the 1500m and the 5000m.
 
Sjöberg finished as national runner-up in the 5000m with a time of 15:34.77 at the NCAA Championships, the best finish by a League or BU woman ever. That also earned her First Team All-America honors in the event. She also qualified for the 1500m final and finished 11^th, snagging a Second Team All-America nod.
 
Sjöberg is the third Terriers’ women’s student-athlete to receive the prestigious League award, joining Caitlin Coker (softball, 2023) and Allison Barwise (outdoor track and field, 2014).
 
The Patriot League Women’s and Men’s Scholar-Athlete of the Year is presented annually. The candidates for these honors are comprised of student-athletes selected as the scholar-athlete of the year in their respective sports. For the 2024-25 academic year, there were 22 different candidates from 24 Patriot League sports.

CHAMPAIGN — Illinois volleyball coach Chris Tamas moved quickly to fill the open spot on his coaching staff, hiring former Pennsylvania coach Meredith Schamun as associate head coach Tuesday.

“We interviewed several great candidates and as the process went on, it was clear that Meredith’s experience as an assistant and head coach will help Illinois volleyball tremendously as we transition into the new era of college athletics,” Tamas said in a statement. “She has a vast recruiting background as well as a deep knowledge of Xs and Os of our game. Her passion and drive for coaching and developing players will add our continued success here at Illinois.”

Schamun, who spent the past four seasons at Penn, will replace Krista Hendrickson on the Illinois coaching staff. Hendrickson was hired away by her alma mater, Washington, last week.

Schamun went 27-67 in four seasons leading the Quakers after inheriting a program that did not compete in 2020 (either in the fall or the delayed spring season) like rest of the Ivy League. That four-year mark includes a 13-10 record last fall with a 7-7 record in the Ivy League. Both were a significant improvement compared to the 2022 and 2023 seasons.

“I was not actively searching for a new coaching position; I was excited for the upcoming season and especially the direction the program is heading,” Schamun said in Penn’s release announcing her resignation. “However, an opportunity has come my way that I believe is the right choice for me at this point in my career. I am grateful to for the opportunity I have coming up, to coach in the Big Ten at the University of Illinois.”

Penn hired Schamun following her two-year run as assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at Villanova. She also spent two seasons at Tulane as an assistant coach and was also the director of volleyball operations at UCF for two seasons.

Schamun was a four-year starter at setter for Rice and was the Conference USA Setter of the Year in 2009 as a junior when she also earned honorable mention AVCA All-American honors. She left Rice as the Owls’ all-time leader in assists with 5,190.

League One Volleyball (LOVB) has announced David Blitzer, Peter J. Holt and Amy Griffin will buy the LOVB Austin Volleyball pro team in Austin, Texas.

The group will also gain an ownership stake in LOVB itself. Griffin, through her private equity firm G9 Ventures, had already been involved in the competition as an investor.

Financial details of the LOVB Austin transaction were not disclosed. With assistance from law firm Proskauer, LOVB’s chief growth officer Stephanie Alger led talks with G9 Ventures, Blitzer’s Bolt Ventures and Spurs Sports & Entertainment, which is chaired by Holt.

The original six LOVB teams had all been owned and operated by the league, but Rosie Spaulding, president of LOVB Pro, said there was always a roadmap towards individual team ownership.

Spaulding said in a video interview that the experience in sports that Blitzer, Holt and Griffin bring to the table will be an invaluable asset to LOVB, and that the group was drawn to LOVB Austin by “the model … and the ecosystem approach that we have with the youth community.”

The new stewards of LOVB Austin, which won the inaugural LOVB championship in April, come to a place that has long supported the sport through the University of Texas’ famed program. Nine of the 15 players in LOVB Austin are former Longhorns—keeping with the league’s mission of promoting local stars.

“Austin is such a hotbed for volleyball,” Spaulding said. “Incredible participation on the club side, incredible success in the collegiate side.”

Blitzer is believed to be the first person invested in all five major male U.S. team sports leagues at the same time, though he is in the process of selling the control stakes of MLS’ Real Salt Lake and the NWSL’s Utah Royals to the Miller family. He is the co-owner both of the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers (valued at $4.57 billion) and the NHL’s New Jersey Devils ($1.7 billion) along with Josh Harris. He’s also an investor in the NFL’s Washington Commanders, of which Harris is the majority owner, and in MLB’s Cleveland Guardians, where he has a pathway to control within the next few years. Through Bolt Ventures, Blitzer holds a stake in Crystal Palace and controls several other European soccer clubs.

While Blitzer has the widest sports ownership portfolio, Holt and Griffin have the strongest ties to Austin and volleyball.

In 1996, Holt’s father, Peter M. Holt, joined the San Antonio Spurs’ ownership group and became the franchise’s majority owner just a few months later. Since then, the Spurs have won five NBA championships, and the family added the NBA G League’s Austin Spurs and the USL’s San Antonio FC to its holdings. (Its former WNBA team, the San Antonio Silver Stars, was sold to MGM International in 2017. The Stars became the Las Vegas Aces, currently the most valuable team in the W.)

Peter J. Holt succeeded his father and mother as the chairman and CEO of Spurs Sports & Entertainment in 2019. The Spurs are valued at $3.79 billion, ranked 20th in Sportico’s NBA franchise valuations.

Griffin, the managing partner of G9 Ventures, leads a private equity firm with investments in On Running, Bumble, Oura and Spanx, among other consumer products. G9 is already an investor in the league, and Spanx is a league-wide sponsor.

A Texas native, Griffin is a former outside hitter and team captain of the women’s volleyball team at the University of Virginia. She is also a New York Times bestselling author. Her memoir The Tell was released in March.

In January, Spaulding said LOVB was weighing expansion outside of its six current markets. When asked this week if the league would focus on adding new clubs or sell the existing teams to well-heeled owners, Spaulding said that pairing the original teams with the right group is more important.

“In approaching the idea of team ownership, we’ve really focused on bringing together the right individuals in the right markets versus selling all teams outright,” Spaulding said. “We’ll continue to be super deliberate and intentional in identifying those [ownership] groups and ensuring that they’re aligned with… what we’re building here, not just on the pro side, but [having] a true ecosystem through our youth-to-pro model.”

It’s been a long journey from Blackfriars swimming carnivals to the world aquatics stage for Shaun Curtis.

On the back of last week’s Australian Swimming Trials, Mr Curtis (BPS’04) has been selected as part of the Australian Dolphins coaching team for the 2025 World Championships in late July.

He joins the likes of Dean Boxall and Mel Marshall as one of just 11 coaches from around Australia chosen to lead the Dolphins in Singapore, where he will make his World Championships debut.

Mr Curtis is the current coach of Olympic gold medallist and five-time world champion Kyle Chalmers, who will contest the 50m freestyle, 100m freestyle and 50m butterfly in Singapore.

“I am so proud to be part of this World Championships team,” said Mr Curtis, who is the Head Coach at Marion Swimming Club.

Mr Curtis, a former Horten House Captain, swam competitively while a student at Blackfriars, winning many swimming carnival age champion medals along the way, although finishing in third place in his final carnival in 2004. (For the record, Luca Vezzosi, of De Vitoria, was the Open Champion at Blackfriars’ 2004 Swimming Carnival.)

He also played water polo for the school and spent many years with Blackfriars Old Scholars Football Club.

But his career path meant he was never far from the water. After leaving Blackfriars, he played state-level water polo and, in 2007, took up a coaching position with Water Polo SA and the South Australian Sports Institute.

A qualified teacher, he had also joined the Norwood Swim School coaching team in 2005, beginning as junior coach, before becoming an assistant coach at Norwood Swimming Club in 2008 and Head Coach in 2012.

In 2022, he was named Head Coach of Marion Swimming Club, South Australia’s largest swimming club.

While with Norwood, Mr Curtis coached two swimmers to Paralympic level – Isabella Vincent, who, at age 15, was the youngest Australian swimmer selected for the Tokyo Paralympics, where she won silver and bronze medals; and Liam Bekric, who was part of team at the 2016 Rio games, finishing fourth in the 100m breaststroke.

He was also selected as one of five Australian coaches for the 2016 Oceania Championships, in Fiji, and as part of seven-strong coaching team for the 2019 Junior World Championships, in Hungary.

Mr Curtis said his years as a student at Blackfriars helped prepare him for his later success.

“Those school water polo games as well as all the school swimming carnivals and inter-school swimming events stand out as highlights of my time at Blackfriars.”