One Boise State team has an NCAA postseason berth. Another is playing for its shot
The Boise State men’s golf team has qualified for the NCAA Regional Championships for the second year in a row.
The Broncos are the No. 9 Seed in the Bryan (Texas) Regional at Texas A&M’s Traditions Club. Play will run May 15-18, and the top five teams from each regional advance to the NCAA Championships May 27-June 1 at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Arizona. The top individual from a non-advancing team at each regional also advances.
“It’s a fun day for us,” Boise State coach Dan Potter said in a news release. “It’s a celebration of a lot of hard work throughout the course of the year, and then there’s the anticipation of where they’re going to send us. I’m happy for our guys and happy for a lot of the people who have supported them and the program over the last couple of years.
“To get there last year and follow it up this year shows you just how good this group of guys is. Everything that we’ve been doing over the last several years in our program has been working.”
The Bryan Regional features 13 teams, plus 10 individual qualifiers. Defending national champion Pepperdine earned the No. 1 seed, while Texas A&M is No. 2 and Georgia is No. 3.
“We’ll be playing at a big-time venue with a lot of good teams,” Potter said. “It’s a big, tough test of a golf course, so now we go from the celebration mode to turn and get ourselves as ready as we can to give it our best shot.”
Boise State golf also qualified for postseason play last season, ending a drought dating back to 1994.
The Broncos are currently ranked 55th nationally by GolfStat. Boise State has finished in the top five in eight tournaments this season, including victories at the Mark Simpson Invitational and the Redhawk Invitational.
Boise State boasts a team scoring average of 284.68 (1.64-under par) per round, which stands as the best scoring average against par in program history.
Hugo Townsend, Skyler Eubank, Max Charles, Alex Talbot and Nick Hedman are projected to represent the Broncos in regional competition.
Softball: Broncos play final homestand
The Boise State softball team has two series remaining in the regular season, beginning with its final homestand this weekend at Dona Larsen Park.
The Broncos (34-10, 13-5 MW), who need a strong finish to boost their postseason chances, host New Mexico (25-22, 5-13) in Mountain West action on Friday (noon), Saturday (2:30 p.m.) and Sunday (noon). They close out their conference schedule May 12-14 at Colorado State.
Boise State is tied for second in the conference standings with UNLV. San Diego State leads the league at 16-2 and 33-12 overall. Only the Mountain West regular-season champion is guaranteed a postseason berth.
The Broncos can make a case for an at-large spot with a strong finish to the regular season. Should they win out, they’d match the program record with 40 wins. They are currently ranked No. 45 in the RPI, which is the highest among Mountain West teams.
Boise State also ranks third in the nation in fielding percentage, at .983. Boise State redshirt senior shortstop Eliyah Flores is on pace to break the school record at her position with a fielding percentage of .956.
Men’s tennis: Broncos hire former player
Boise State Athletic Director Jeramiah Dickey announced the hiring of Luke Shields as men’s tennis coach on Wednesday.
Shields is a former All-American with the Broncos and was selected for induction into the Boise State Athletics Hall of Fame in 2020.
“Luke checked every box we were looking for in our next head coach,” Dickey said in a news release. “He is a servant leader that is committed to the student-athlete experience, and he has a proven track record as a recruiter and a head coach. It just so happens that he is also one of the greatest student-athletes in the history of our department, and he cares deeply about the direction of this program.
“He is an elite competitor and a man of integrity, and I couldn’t be more thrilled to bring him home to Boise.”
Shields, who owns Boise State’s career (119) and single-season (35) records for wins, previously spent six seasons as the head coach at Fresno State (2014-21) and was the associate head coach at Oklahoma last season.
“It feels great to be coming home” Shields said. “I spent eight years in Boise, and I’m thrilled to be coming back to a place where I have so many fond memories. We will work hard so that this program is consistently competing as one of the best in the country. The standards will be higher than they’ve ever been.”
Shields previously served as an associate head coach with the Broncos from 2013 to 2015. He has prior stops as an assistant at Washington and Marshall.
Men’s basketball: Broncos lose big man
Redshirt senior center Mladen Armus will not use his extra year of eligibility, a Boise State spokesperson confirmed Tuesday.
The NCAA granted players an extra year of eligibility because of the COVID-19 pandemic, but the 25-year-old Serbian native won’t be coming back for the 2021-22 season.
Armus started all 35 games last season, averaging a team-best 8.0 rebounds to go with 7.1 points.
That means the Broncos could lose four of five starters from last season’s Mountain West regular-season and tournament championship team. Abu Kigab is out of eligibility, while redshirt seniors Marcus Shaver Jr. and Emmanuel Akot have each declared for the upcoming NBA Draft.
Both Shaver and Akot maintained their right to return for their final season, but Akot also entered his name in the transfer portal.
That leaves reigning Mountain West Freshman of the Year Tyson Degenhart as the Broncos’ potential lone returning starter.
To bolster their lineup, the Broncos recently signed Sadraque Nganga — the highest-ranked recruit to join the Boise State men’s basketball team directly out of high school — and Texas Tech transfer Chibuzo Agbo.
Agbo, a 6-foot-7 sophomore guard, averaged 1.5 points and 1.0 rebounds per game for the Red Raiders, playing in 23 of their 37 games last season. He will have three years of eligibility remaining.
Volleyball: Garus receives contract extension
A Mountain West Tournament championship and the program’s second-ever NCAA Tournament appearance have paid off for Boise State volleyball coach Shawn Garus and his staff.
Garus received a two-year contract extension Tuesday, and assistant coach Candy Murphy was promoted to associated head coach.
“Our volleyball program has positioned itself to compete for championships while developing student-athletes both on and off the court, and that is a direct result of the leadership of Shawn Garus and our staff,” Dickey said in a news release. “I am thrilled to be able to invest in our coaches, program and student-athletes as we continue building on last season’s successes.”
Garus’ extension runs his contract through Jan. 31, 2025; Murphy also received a contract extension that keeps her with the Broncos through Feb. 29, 2024. Both coaches have been with Boise State for 13 seasons.
Under their guidance, Boise State is 230-159 overall, with a winning record in 10 of their 13 seasons, including each of the past seven. They’ve won at least 20 matches four times (2010, 2015, 2016, 2021).
Garus has twice earned Mountain West Coach of the Year and was named the 2016 AVCA Region Coach of the Year.
This story was originally published May 4, 2022 at 3:44 PM.
