Sawyer Woodard of Tuscola joins the exclusive list this year.

YEAR ATHLETE SCHOOL

2025 Sawyer Woodard Tuscola

2024 Josiah Hortin Tuscola

2023 Daniel Lacy Centennial

2022 Kemoni McCullough Centennial

2021 CJ Shoaf Mahomet-Seymour

2019 Hunter Hendershot Mahomet-Seymour

2018 Steven Migut Unity

2017 Nicholas Jackson Champaign Central

2016 Jon Davis Oakwood

2015 Jon Davis Oakwood

2014 Johnny Leverenz Danville

2013 Ryan Pearce Villa Grove

2012 Steve Schroeder Monticello

2011 Brandon Carrel Urbana

2010 Brandon Noe St. Thomas More

2009 Ian Wells Champaign Central

2008 Tyler Carter Tuscola

2007 Aaron Mathis Urbana

2006 Scott Phelps Monticello

2005 Scott Phelps Monticello

Bill Dellinger, one of the most influential figures in track and field, distance running and the University of Oregon’s history, died June 27 at the age of 91.

By Martin Cleary

Henrik Neuspiel is a natural athlete.

Pick a sport and he has likely given it a try and had success in his journey.

Sport was a natural avenue to follow as his father Victor competed in three world championships in kayaking and his mother Margaret Nelson Neuspiel played for Canada’s women’s water polo squad.

For the past dozen years, he has been recognized as a hockey player in the winter and a flatwater sprint kayaker in the summer. But he’s more than just a two-sport athlete.

During his three years of studying in the High Performance Athlete program at John McCrae Secondary School, he participated in varsity rugby and track and field. In his first two years of high school, he was the top novice (while attending Merivale High School) and junior shot put thrower at the National Capital Secondary School Athletic Association and Eastern Ontario levels. He competed at the 2023 OFSAA championships in boys’ junior shot put.

His performances in track and rugby earned him the school’s top athlete award in each sport in 2023.

As a Grade 9 student-athlete at Merivale, he was selected the junior athlete of the year for his overall efforts.

Neuspiel also has been known to play on his high school basketball and volleyball teams and compete in cross-country running races in the fall and cross-country skiing events in the winter.

As for hockey, he climbed as high as a U16 AA-level defenceman and played Canada’s national winter sport for 12 years.

His summers were spent at the Rideau Canoe Club, starting in week-long, learn-to-paddle canoe programs before graduating to provincial, national and international championships, where he has won 54 medals, including 30 gold.

But during his last several hockey and kayaking seasons, the 6’5″ 18-year-old was trying to work a new sport into his repertoire – rowing.

For the past four years, he has attended the RBC Training Ground tryout sessions at the University of Ottawa. It’s an opportunity for young athletes to be tested in front of technical recruiters from a variety of Canadian sport governing bodies.

More than 2,000 athletes take part in this athletic showcase and the top 30 are declared RBC Olympians and awarded financial assistance packages with the goal of making a specific national team. While Neuspiel didn’t qualify for the top 30 each year, he attracted some interest from rowing.

“I hadn’t grown out of kayaking. I love it. But rowing was a really good opportunity for me,” explained Neuspiel about switching sports late in his youth.

While rowing was now on his sports agenda, he didn’t act on it immediately. He wanted to savour the end of his junior kayaking career with some international flavour.

Neuspiel started to tinker with rowing last year by doing some ERG testing, where he was timed over 2,000 metres on a stationary rowing machine. His scores were eye popping and attention grabbing. His sports career is now devoted to rowing.

He has committed to attend Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire for the 2025-26 academic year and will race for The Big Green as a freshman.

Rowing Canada also has seen his potential as well as three other Ottawa Rowing Club teammates, who have been named to represent Canada at the Intercontinental Rowing Challenge on July 15-16 in Ypsilanti, Michigan. Neuspiel will be joined by Max Froeschl, Jack Coulson and Samaya Khosla.

“I have been in contact with Zak Lewis (Ottawa Rowing Club head coach) for quite a while, after he reached out to me three to four years ago,” Neuspiel said. “He accommodated me. I didn’t want to jump in it right away.”

Neuspiel signed off on his youth kayaking career in 2024 by competing for Canada at the World Junior Sprint Canoe Championships in Plovdiv, Bulgaria, and the Canoe Sprint Olympic Hopes Regatta in Szeged, Hungary.

At the Olympic Hopes, he won a silver medal in the K2 500-metre final. At the world juniors, he helped Canada to a sixth-place showing in the boys’ K4 500-metre final, which was the country’s best result in that discipline in 10 years.

While Neuspiel hasn’t started serious racing as a rower, he has taken part in regular ERG ranking sessions. He is considered the top male junior on the Canadian ERG rankings and has a personal-best time of six minutes and seven seconds for 2,000 metres.

At six feet, five inches, Neuspiel has an ideal frame for rowing, is fit from his years of kayaking with a double-bladed paddle and has a powerful engine to cut through the water now with one or two oars.

Rowing also allowed him the valuable tool to chase a university education at an Ivy League school. Ivy League schools offer grant-in-aid rather than full or partial scholarships to its student-athletes and rowing is one of those eligible varsity sports. Kayaking or canoeing isn’t a varsity sport in Canada or the United States.

“I saw more opportunities in rowing. Once I tested (on the ERG), I liked it,” explained Neuspiel, an honours high school student with a high 80s average. “It was a no-brainer not to get into it.”

Neuspiel made the maximum five visits to American universities to study the academics, the campuses and the rowing programs at Princeton, Yale, Brown, Dartmouth and Stanford.

“I was fortunate I could go fast on the ERG,” he added. “It gave me a lot of leverage. I had quite a good number of schools (recruit me). I was fortunate to have a choice.”

He plans to study either chemical engineering or finance at Dartmouth, whose head coach is Wyatt Allen, an Olympic gold medallist at the 2004 Athens Summer Games and a bronze-medal winner at the 2008 Athens Games in the men’s eights.

“It will definitely be an uphill battle,” Neuspiel said about his freshman rowing season. “The program has 40 to 50 guys. I don’t expect to push the top boats immediately. I want to work hard under their guidance.

“In my first year, I will not be the fastest. In the second, third and fourth years, I want to enjoy the whole process and come out with success through hard work and improvement.”

Neuspiel is in the early days of developing into a rower. He was successful going forward as a kayaker. Now, he wants to do the same, but going backwards.

“Personally, I need to be more comfortable. I’ll start slow. Then, I’ll move up and up to a comfortable racing speed,” he outlined.

“Rowing was always what I wanted to end up doing. It was a little delayed.”

Read More of our 2025 High School Best Series as we tip our caps to top local student-athletes at: OttawaSportsPages.ca/Ottawa-High-School-Best-2025

Related

TUSCOLA — Sawyer and Hunter Woodard have been going back and forth for a few years now.

Rather, Sawyer has been catching up with — and even surpassing in some areas — his older brother, giving him more ammo to debate on who had the better high school career.

Hunter graduated from Tuscola in 2018. He helped lead the Warriors’ football team to a Class 1A runner-up season and won a state shot put title as a senior before going on to have a successful college football career as an offensive lineman at Oklahoma State University.

Sawyer ended his time at Tuscola this past spring by leading the Warriors’ track and field team to a second consecutive 1A state runner-up trophy with the now Tuscola graduate producing a pair of third-place finishes in the discus and shot put. That came after helping the boys’ basketball team to a 29-win season and a fourth straight regional plaque as a senior.

“Seeing how good he was in track and football made me want to accomplish the same things in my sports and pushed me to be the best I could be,” Sawyer said of his brother.

It almost feels like a coin flip at first glance. Maybe you give the edge to Hunter because of the state championship, something Sawyer never accomplished. That said, Sawyer got another leg up on his brother last week, and they happened to be right next to each other when he heard the news.

Sawyer Woodard is The News-Gazette’s 2025 All-Area boys’ track and field Athlete of the Year, a title Hunter never held.

“When I got that text, I was with my brother, and I was surprised,” Sawyer said. “I told my brother, he high-fived me and we celebrated. It was just a really exciting moment. I’m never going to let him live this down.”

Hunter couldn’t help but put the sibling rivalry aside and smile.

“I’m extremely proud of him,” Hunter said. “I’ve watched how hard he’s worked and progressed over the last several years, and I know he deserves this award. There are a lot of deserving athletes in the area, but I’m glad to see Sawyer’s hard work has been recognized. He’s always been a great athlete and has developed himself well.”

Sawyer Woodard believed he had the potential to become one of the best throwers in the state when he walked in the door as a freshman, but it came across as more cockiness than confidence. Tuscola athletic director and boys’ track and field coach Ryan Hornaday has known Woodard from a young age, with his son, David, being good friends with him. He said he’s seen “incredible growth” in Woodard over the years.

“His physical attributes speak for themselves, but what the average person doesn’t see is his growth in maturity,” Hornaday said. “As a freshman, he thought he had a lot of stuff figured out, but he decided to listen to some people who knew some things as he came along, and the distances improved from pretty good to outstanding.”

Woodard laughed when he heard that story, but he couldn’t disagree. He swallowed his pride, got himself in better shape and became one of the best teammates and leaders you could ask for in high school sports.

That led him from believing to knowing he could be one of the state’s top throwers.

After the Warriors’ postseason basketball run, Woodard only had two chances to qualify for the indoor state meet. He was able to do that and went on to place sixth in the shot put. He knew he had more in the tank, and he knew discus was his primary event, so he set his sights on a pair of outdoor championships. While he ultimately finished third in both events, he was plenty pleased with his performance.

“I’m definitely not one of those super outgoing leaders, but I push people to be their best,” Woodard said. “Every team needs a leader, and I definitely felt responsible for taking that position this year. Last year, we all relied on Josiah (Hortin) and the distance runners. This year, I knew I had to step up and carry the team with the amount of points I could get, and that ultimately led to us getting second in state.”

Tuscola’s runner-up team finish a year ago was the highest state placement in program history, a foregone conclusion by most accounts with the dream team the Warriors had. Matching that result this year came as a bit of a surprise, and it couldn’t have happened without Woodard’s contributions.

“He’s a big piece of the puzzle to what we do, and he had a lot to do with us winning the sectional and coming home with a state trophy,” Hornaday said. “Not for a second did it cross any of our minds that he’d somehow have a letdown. He’s been so steady. He was always ready to compete with the best in the area, which prepared him to compete with the best in the state.”

Woodard’s state performance in late May at Eastern Illinois University’s O’Brien Field, which will be his next home after committing to EIU earlier that month, also solidified him as the next great Tuscola thrower.

The Warriors have had numerous state medalist throwers in their history, producing at least one seemingly every year. Aiden Weaver joined Woodard on the podium last year, and Chris Boyd was before them. Hunter Woodard carried the torch prior to that, and the list keeps going from Stephen Gibson in the mid 2010s to Jeff Hettinger in the early 1990s all the way back to Earl Parker in 1908 and so many more in between.

“We have a long line of throwers who have been state medalists, and Sawyer is the next big name on that long list,” Hornaday said. “We’ve had a conference track meet for 12-15 years, and the shot put record-holder is Hunter Woodard, and the discus record-holder is Sawyer Woodard. It’s pretty cool that we have both throwing records, but it’s especially unique that they’re brothers. Sawyer’s been great, and he’s right there in the thick of the long list of great throwers we’ve had at Tuscola.”

And get ready to learn the name Brayden Weaver, who finished 16th and 28th in the 1A shot put and discus, respectively, as a freshman. Woodard said Weaver is “going to be amazing.”

Until then, the spotlight will be on Woodard, and he couldn’t have asked for a better way to end his high school career.

“It feels awesome,” Woodard said. “I watched Hunter before being with Chris. I’ve been with great throwers for a while, and seeing what they did, I wanted to accomplish the exact same things. I’d say I have, and that feels great. I’m sure we’re going to have a lot more amazing throwers in the future.”

MALTA            13

UKRAINE        12

(3-5, 2-1, 4-5, 4-1)

The Malta women’s U-16 national team bagged their first win at the European Championship finals when they edged Ukraine 13-12 in a thrilling encounter in Istanbul.

It was a spirited performance from Aurelien Cousin’s girls, who had to come from behind to see off their opponents and put themselves in a strong position to finish among the top 12 countries in the continental finals.

Malta is now sharing top spot in the group with Romania and will now await the result of Sunday’s clash between the Romanians and Ukraine as a win for the former will see Malta secure a place in the Top 12 phase of the competition.

But whatever happens on Sunday, the win over Ukraine is a major achievement for Cousin’s squad, which is formed by several young players.

One cannot not mention the performance of 11-year-old goalkeeper Mia Clarke Spiteri, the youngest player to be playing in this championship, and Elly Micheli, scorer of four goals.

The result somewhat atones for the tough 14-10 defeat in Friday’s opening group match, where the Maltese girls had also come close to upsetting their more-quoted opponents but came up just short in the final stages of the match.  

“I could not be more prouder of the effort the girls today,” coach Aurelien Cousin told the Times of Malta.

“Yesterday, the girls were very disappointed as they felt that they could have achieved a better result against Romania.  But in the afternoon we regrouped as a team and this morning, they were determined to go out for the win and try and leave everything they had in the pool to achieve their goal.

“As the match progressed, the players started to listen to my instructions more and more and the team spirit was amazing.

“I am very pleased with this result as it shows that all the work we have put in is finally paying off. Winning against Ukraine is a major achievement, as despite all their problems, they are still a much bigger country than us, who boast much more resources and players.

“Ending the group with one win and one defeat is an amazing result, and we now just wait for the result of Sunday’s match between Romania and Ukraine to see if we will progress to the Top 12 or not.

“Whatever happens, we will keep working hard to continue to make Malta proud.”

Ukraine were off to a strong start as they raced into a 5-3 lead by the end of the opening session, with Malta’s goals coming from a brace from Chloe Amato and another from Kaylon Cutajar.

The Maltese girls fought back in the second session, and goals from Micheli and Luisa Borgia enabled them to change ends 6-5 behind.

The third session turned out to be a hard-fought affair with the Ukrainians seemingly gaining a crucial two-goal lead before the final quarter – 11-9.

Amato stood out for Malta when netting a hat-trick with the other goal coming from Nevise Agius.

But the character of the Maltese girls came to the fore in the final session as Micheli scored a fine hat-trick to pull her team level at 12-all to throw the match wide open.

It was the Maltese girls who managed to hold control of their nerves with Agius firing home a brilliant goal to hand the team a fine victory.

MALTA: R. Babiker, L. Borgia 1, K. Portelli, C. Amato 5, H. Camilleri, M. Grech, K. Cutajar, E. Micheli 4, M. Tully, E. Cushing, N. Agius 2, M. Clarke Spiteri

SEARCY — Five members of the Harding women’s track and field team have been named to the Academic All-District Team by the Collegiate Sports Communicators (CSC), formerly CoSIDA, recognizing their achievements in both athletics and academics. Seniors Cadence Sansom and Kiera Blankinship, both All-Americans on the track, will now advance to the Academic All-America ballot.

To qualify for the Academic All-District team, student-athletes must be at least a sophomore academically, hold a minimum 3.50 cumulative grade point average, and be ranked in the top 50 regionally in at least one event.

Harding’s honorees include:

• Josie Parks (Jr., D, Columbia, Tenn.) Parks, an exercise science major with a 3.87 GPA, was a standout in distance events. She was ranked seventh in the NCAA Division II Central Region and 40th nationally in the 3,000-meter steeplechase with a time of 10:52.71. This season, Parks claimed the 2025 Great American Conference (GAC) championship in the 1,500 meters (4:40.27) and finished third in the steeplechase (11:00.55).

• Dinah Winders (Sr., D, Mansfield, Tenn.) Winders, an accounting major, achieved a perfect 4.00 GPA. She was ranked 31st regionally in the outdoor 1,500 meters with a time of 4:40.58. At the GAC Championships, Winders secured a second-place finish in the 1,500 meters (4:40.81) and placed fifth in the 5,000 meters with a personal-best time of 18:01.53.

• Veagen Jones (Sr., MD, Edmond, Okla.) Jones, an exercise science major, earned a 3.50 GPA. She was ranked 30th regionally in the outdoor 800 meters, clocking a time of 2:14.21. Jones also placed fifth in the 800 meters at the GAC Championships with a time of 2:15.79.

• Cadence Sansom (Sr., PV, Lago Vista, Texas) Sansom, a criminal justice major with a 3.85 GPA, distinguished herself in the pole vault. She was ranked sixth regionally and 11th nationally in the indoor pole vault (4.03m, 13-2.5). Sansom earned Second Team All-America honors in both the indoor pole vault, finishing 11th with a mark of 4.07m (13-4.25), and the outdoor pole vault, where she placed 10th with a jump of 3.92m (12-10.25). Sansom’s achievements will now be considered for Academic All-America.

• Kiera Blankinship (Sr., HJ, Chickasha, Okla.) Blankinship, a marriage and family counseling major, was ranked seventh regionally and 21st nationally in the outdoor high jump (1.72m, 5-7.75). She earned Second Team All-America honors in the outdoor pole vault with a 10th-place finish at nationals, clearing 1.68m (5-6). Blankinship joins Sansom on the Academic All-America ballot.

The CSC Academic All-America program highlights student-athletes who excel academically and athletically, providing national recognition for their comprehensive success.