Above, members of the golf team celebrate Binghamton's first-ever ECAC Championship. In the fall season, head coach John Affleck led his team to five tournament titles.

Golfers capture BU's first-ever ECAC Championship

The accomplishments of the entire golf team and tennis player Akshay Rao highlighted the fall athletics season -- Binghamton's first in the America East Conference.

Golf team sets a new record

The golf team had a record-setting fall season for coach John Affleck, who is midway through his 15th and final year at the helm of Binghamton's historically most successful sports program. The golfers won five of eight tournaments in the fall, including the program's first-ever ECAC Championship. That title was particularly special, as it was secured in front of friends and family at BU's own Links at Hiawatha Landing course. At the two-day tournament, BU placed four individuals in the top 10, highlighted by senior captain Adam Fuchs, who won individual medalist honors. The Bearcats simply ran away from the field, defeating runner-up Harvard and the rest of the 16-team field by 18 strokes.

Binghamton also captured tournaments hosted by Colgate, Bucknell and Columbia, and finished strong at premier events hosted by Dartmouth and St. John's. Led by Fuchs (73.3), BU boasted five golfers with sub-76 scoring averages, and the Bearcats achieved a national team rating higher than that of Michigan, Nebraska, San Diego and other prominent athletic programs.

Sophomore Akshay Rao enjoyed an outstanding fall tennis season, going 13-1 overall and advancing to the round of 16 at the prestigious ITA East Regional.

Tennis: Rao goes 13-1 overall

Akshay Rao, a sophomore from New Delhi, India, enjoyed an outstanding fall campaign at the top of coach Michael Starke's lineup. He went 13-1 overall, including an undefeated 4-0 dual match record. In the process, Rao won the "A" flight at the Cornell Invitational and advanced to the round of 16 at the prestigious Intercollegiate Tennis Association East Regional, hosted by Penn. At Cornell, Rao knocked off high seeds from Army and Yale, and at the ITA event, he defeated the tournament's sixth seed from Harvard in a thrilling three-set match.

The women's tennis team, coached by Jamie Campbell, went 2-0 in an abbreviated fall season.

Sophomore Stephen Bruce was named to the America East all-conference team and the menÕs soccer team tripled its win total from last season.

Men's soccer tops previous season's wins

The men's team showed significant improvement under first-year coach Paul Marco, going 6-11-1 overall and finishing seventh in the America East. The win total equaled that of the previous two seasons combined, and showed the program's promise. One of Marco's skilled international recruits, Graham Munro (Scotland), was the only freshman honored as a first-team all-conference pick. The men held 10 opponents to a goal or less and toppled long-time rivals Oneonta and Buffalo along the way.

A winning season for women's soccer

On the soccer fields, the women's team produced a winning season for the 16th consecutive year -- the fifth straight for coach Jeff Leightman. Binghamton's 9-7-2 record included a stunning 1-0 victory over America East champion and NCAA tournament team Hartford, plus wins over state rivals Colgate, Albany and St. Bonaventure. In their first season of America East play, the women were well represented on the all-conference team, as five players were honored by the league, including Binghamton-area junior Tracy Kasmarcik, who led the entire league with 12 goals.

Cross country teams move up the ranks

In cross country, the Bearcats showed improvement in their second year in America East. Coached by Annette Acuff, the men's team moved up to sixth at the conference championship, while the women's team captured the season-opening Colgate Invitational.

omen's volleyball defeats Buffalo, Albany The volleyball team, also a young squad, was led by sophomore Anne Crocus, who led the America East and ranked among the nation's leaders in blocks. Under coach Glenn Kiriyama, the Bearcats posted wins over Buffalo and Albany and held their own against strong programs such as Maryland, Iowa and George Washington.

Senior guard Anthony Green scored 11 points against Syracuse and leads the Bearcats in scoring, assists and three-point field goals. He was named the America East Conference Player of the Week twice in the season's first eight weeks.

Men's basketball battles top Division I teams

In the span of 20 days in December, the men's basketball team played the three toughest and most prominent opponents in school history before average crowds of nearly 13,000. Iowa State, Syracuse and Villanova were all rated in the country's top 75 (out of 327 Division I programs), and while the Bearcats went winless in those games, the team impressed opposing coaches and fans with its tenacity and rapid improvement as a young Division I program.

The team's best performance came against Villanova on Dec. 27. The Bearcats jumped out to a nine-point lead with less than four minutes left in the half, led by six at the break and forced Villanova into 15 first-half turnovers. The sellout crowd in the Pavilion was reduced to boos for its home team as the Bearcats were halfway toward a monumental upset. The Wildcats responded, however, and took the lead for good in the game's final 10 minutes. Binghamton hung tough down the stretch and battled to the final horn in a respectable 68-53 defeat.

Making opponents work 40 minutes is quickly becoming a trademark of Coach Walker's teams, and his 2002-03 squad entered America East play in early January having put a scare into several of the nation's elite programs.

-- John Hartrick