Sports Briefs: Winter 2010

Six former athletes were inducted into the Baylor Athletic Hall of Fame on October 23.

Jason Jennings was a Baylor pitcher and hitter who was named the college baseball player of the year in 1999. Billy Hollis was a sprinter who won three gold medals in the 1960 Southwest Conference track championships. Stacey Bowers Smith was Baylor’s first female individual NCAA champion when she won the 1999 outdoor triple jump.

The other three inductees were football players from the early 1980s, including All-America defensive lineman Charles Benson, All-America offensive lineman Frank Ditta, and quarterback Jay Jeffrey.

Top Basketball Prospects

The Baylor men’s and women’s basketball teams signed two of the top players in the country during the NCAA early signing period on November 11.

Odyssey Sims was rated the number-two women’s recruit in the country by ESPN.com. The five-foot-eight point guard averaged 18.3 points and 7.2 assists for Irving MacArthur as a junior.

Perry Jones is a six-ten center from Duncanville who was rated the third men’s recruit nationally by ESPNU. He averaged twelve points and eight rebounds as a junior. Bakari Turner, a guard from Plano West, also signed with the Bears.

High Honors

Baylor center J. D. Walton was named to the first team of the Associated Press All-America Team. The last time a Baylor center was named to the list was thirty-five years ago. Walton transferred to Baylor from Arizona State and started thirty-six straight games for the Bears in the past three seasons.

Baylor linebacker Joe Pawelek was named second-team ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America for the second straight season. An economics and finance major, he has a 3.71 GPA.

Two Baylor senior volleyball players—setter Taylor Barnes and middle blocker Anna Breyfogle—were named All Americans, the first in Baylor volleyball history. Both made the Honorable Mention team.