Minnesota women’s diver Rebecca Cornthwaite has been selected to participate in the 2003 World University Games. Cornthwaite, who is training in Australia, will travel to South Korea to represent Australia from August 16-27.
Cornthwaite earned All-America honorable mention honors this past season in platform diving, becoming the first Gophers diver to garner All-America honors since Laurie Nelson in 1990-91. Cornthwaite just missed the top eight, finishing ninth in the platform, posting a score of 394.75. It was the second straight year Cornthwaite competed at the NCAA Championships.
Cornthwaite will join teammate Keri Hehn and Minnesota men’s swimmer Justin Mortimer at the World University Games. Minnesota women’s coach Jean Freeman and men’s coach Dennis Dale will also serve as assistant coaches at the World University Games.
Women’s tennis
The Minnesota Athletics Department has announced that Luciano Battaglini has been named assistant coach of the women’s tennis team. Battaglini replaces Kristin Sanderson, who was an assistant at Minnesota for two seasons.
Battaglini joins Minnesota after spending one season as an assistant coach of the Oklahoma State women’s tennis team. He helped lead the Cowgirls to their first Big 12 Championship in school history. Oklahoma State finished the year ranked 25th in the nation.
A native of Brazil, Battaglini received his Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from Oklahoma Christian University where he played tennis from 1996-2000. He was a 2000 ITA All-American and ITA Academic All-American. Battaglini earned his master’s degree in family science from Oklahoma State.
Meanwhile, the women’s tennis team received the ITA All-Academic Team award and five student-athletes were cited for their individual academic success. Senior Michaela Havelkova; juniors Brandi Watts, Angela Buergis and Amy Thomas; and freshman Nischela Reddy were named ITA scholar-athletes.
The ITA All-Academic team award is open to any ITA program that has a cumulative team grade point average of 3.20 or above (on a 4.0 scale).
