12

Thursday, July 21, 2016
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
SPORTS

 

school records, two each year 

until almost most of the sprinting 
marks were hers: indoor 60-meter 
dash, indoor 200-meter dash, 
indoor 60-meter hurdles, outdoor 
100-meter dash, outdoor 100-
meter hurdles and 4x400-meter 
relay (along with her team).

Male athlete of the year: 

Mason Ferlic, track and field, 
cross country

Ferlic might not be the most 

recognizable name in Michigan 
sports, but how do you pick against 
the NCAA Champion in the Stee-
ple Chase?

The man they call Big Bird made 

up for his fall in the 2015 NCAA 
Track and Field 
Championships 
by winning the 
3,000-meter 
Steeple Chase in 
2016. He topped 
off a dominant 
career as a Wol-
verine, 
which 

has 
seen 
him 

take home UST-
FCCCA 
All-

America honors 
five times and win five Big Ten 
Championships to match. And 
that’s only on the track.

In cross-country season, Ferlic 

also won the Great Lakes Regional 
10,000-meter run and helped the 
Wolverines to win the Big Ten title 
for the first time since 1998. In the 
end, Ferlic’s NCAA title this sea-
son was enough to edge Connor for 
male athlete of the year honors.

Team of the year: Softball
It seems strange to give the 

softball team this award in a year 
that Carol Hutchins’ team actually 
underperformed from its previous 
season. But when you make the 
Women’s College World Series an 
annual destination, as the Wolver-
ines have in recent years, you get 
the benefit of the doubt.

For most of the season, Michi-

gan jockeyed with Florida for 
national supremacy. The Gators 
had knocked off the Wolverines 
in the World Series Final one year 
ago, and they seemed destined for 
a rematch in Oklahoma City.

But when Georgia upset Florida 

in the Super Regionals, Michigan 
looked poised to make a serious 
run at a title that has eluded them 
in their dominant Romero Era. 
Instead, a pair of early losses sent 
Wolverines to an early exit, and 
Oklahoma’s Sydney Romero — 
Sierra’s younger sister — captured 
the title in the year Sierra was 
National Player of the Year.

With stars like Romero, Sierra 

Lawrence and Sara Driesenga on 
their way out, the program could 
be looking at a regression in 2017. 
But with Hutchins at the helm, 
Michigan is a threat year in and 
year out to leave Oklahoma City as 
champion.

They’ll have to settle for a 

Schefter in the meantime.

Career Achievement Award: 

Sierra Romero, softball

This award isn’t ambiguous. 

Almost half of Michigan’s women’s 
sports teams have won Big Ten 
titles in the past four years, but only 
two have won all four, and Romero 
has accomplished the most.

From moment she arrived on 

campus, she has started all 253 

games. 
Once, 

during 
the 

NCAA 
Tour-

nament in her 
sophomore 
year, 
she 
was 

severely ill and 
needed IV fluids 
beforehand, and 
she still helped 
Michigan upset 
Arizona 
State 

twice to move 

onto the Super Regional.

She broke records every year: 

single-season home runs (23) as a 
freshman; batting average (.491) 
and runs (74) as a sophomore; 
RBI (83) as a junior; and a series 
of career marks as a senior until 
she had almost all of them. In each 
year she was consistent, in each 
year she seemed to play a different 
role for the team and yet in each 
year she was equally valuable.

Romero swept the national play-

er of the year awards as a senior 
and earned All-American honors 
in each of her four seasons at two 
different positions, moving to sec-
ond base early in her junior year. 
She leaves as the NCAA career 
record holder in runs and grand 
slams, and she is the only player 
ever to amass 300 runs, 300 hits 
and 300 RBI.

More 
significantly, 
Romero 

served as the face of the program, 
starting almost right when she 
began her career. She sparked the 
Wolverines when they were play-
ing well, and carried them when 
they weren’t. “She has more swag 
than anybody on the planet,” coach 
Carol Hutchins said of Romero this 
year.

Hutchins has spoken as highly 

of Romero as any other player 
in recent memory, and in one of 
Michigan’s most successful pro-
grams, it says a lot that Romero 
will go down as likely the greatest 
player in school history.

M Den provides preview of Nike gear

By ORION SANG

Summer Managing Sports Editor

Pay a visit to the M Den web-

site and you’ll be greeted with a 
countdown clock to Aug. 1, the 
first day Michigan’s apparel con-
tract with Nike begins.

Pay a visit to the M Den ware-

house and you’ll find that most 
Adidas products have already 
been moved to make room for the 
scores of boxes containing the 
newest Nike gear.

Out with the old and in with 

the new, as they say.

Wednesday, the M Den hosted 

several members of the media 
to discuss the store’s upcoming 
release of Mich-
igan-themed 
Nike apparel as 
well as provide a 
preview of vari-
ous products.

The M Den 

has been plan-
ning its launch 
of the new gear 
for over a year 
now, according 
to Scott Hirth, 
the co-owner of M Den.

It will begin a week-long prod-

uct release next week, starting 
with an extravagant midnight 
release on July 31.

According to Hirth, State 

Street will be blocked off between 
Williams and 
Liberty 
from 

10 p.m. to 2 
a.m. to accom-
modate 
the 

large amount 
of consumers 
that 
is 
cur-

rently 
antici-

pated. 
There 

will be a roll-
out party that 
will include 60 
members of the Michigan march-
ing band, members of the dance 
team, special guest appearances 
and a DJ.

Most of the 

fall 
line 
of 

products 
will 

be unveiled at 
the 
midnight 

release 
with 

the exception 
of the football 
jerseys. Michi-
gan’s 
agree-

ment 
with 

Nike includes 
a 
stipulation 

that calls for the football and 
both men’s and women’s bas-
ketball teams to be outfitted by 
Jordan Brand, a division of Nike 
characterized by the famous 

Jumpman icon in place of the 
Nike Swoosh.

Instead, 
the 

football jerseys 
will be unveiled 
separately 
on 

Aug. 2 at the M 
Den located on 
State Street in a 
ceremony open 
only by invita-
tion. In addition 
to the reveal of 
the football jer-
sey, the Aug. 2 

event will also present the new 
Michigan-themed shoe designed 
by Jordan Brand, dubbed the Air 
Jordan Trainer 1.

The jerseys and Air Jordan 

Trainer 1 will then be made avail-
able to the public on Aug. 6. The 
jersey will be available at all M 
Den locations while the shoe 
will be available at just the State 
Street location and on the M Den 
website — which, according to 
Hirth, has been recently beefed 
up to deal with the flood of visi-
tors expected during the launch 
week.

Hirth 
believes 
that, 
even 

though a large order was placed, 
the shoe will be one of their 
quickest selling items and will 
most likely sell out in a brief peri-
od of time.

Romero was 

national player 
of the year as a 

senior.

COURTESY OF THE M DEN AND NIKE

Starting Aug. 1, the M Den will have a week-long release of new Michigan-themed Nike products — including the shirt above.

The M Den will 
host a midnight 

release event 

July 31.

Michigan’s 

apparel contract 
with Nike will 
begin Aug. 1.

