The Wolfpacker: An Independent Magazine Covering NC State Sports
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130 ■ THE WOLFPACKER days later. In her final race at NC State, Perry took fifth with a career‑best time of 12.87 seconds — second fastest ever in school history (behind Ebony Foster's 12.81 seconds in 2004). Perry became the first NCSU track performer to receive All‑ America recognition in both the 100‑meter hurdles and long jump. ■ Breakout Male Performer Of The Year Rising senior Pete Renda always seemed on the verge of developing into an All‑Amer‑ ican wrestler. He won 27 matches at 174 pounds as a freshman, third most ever in a single season by a NC State freshman. He also finished third at the ACC Championships that year and earned an automatic bid to the NCAA Championships. A year later, Renda won 20 matches, in‑ cluding a pair at the NCAA Championships, where he went 2‑2. Renda started to put it all together this past season after moving up in weight class to 184 pounds. He went 26‑8 overall and reached the ACC finals to finish second in the confer‑ ence, but it was at the NCAA Championships where he made his mark. He rolled to a stunning 18‑3 technical fall over No. 8 Nolan Byrd of Oklahoma State in the third‑place match to finish third and earn All‑America honors. Renda defeated the fourth, fifth, eighth and ninth seeds during the NCAA Championships, losing only to top‑ seeded and two‑time national champion Gabe Dean in six matches. ■ Breakout Female Performer Of The Year Hannah Moore is a Cary, N.C., native who transferred to NC State after starting her swimming career at Michigan. She became eligible in January and made an immediate impact for the Wolfpack, especially in the distance freestyle swims. Moore, a rising junior, finished fourth in the 1,650 freestyle and sixth in the 500 free‑ style at the NCAA Championships. She ad‑ ditionally reached the B‑finals in the 400 individual medley to score points in three different races for NC State. That helped the Wolfpack finish ninth at the national meet, marking the program's first top‑10 finish since 1982. She also placed among the top three in all three of those races at the ACC Champion‑ ships and was an Olympic Trials qualifier in the 400‑ and 800‑meter freestyle, the 200‑ and 400‑meter individual medley, and the 200‑meter backstroke. ■ Most Improved Team Women's head tennis coach Simon Earn‑ shaw engineered an impressive turnaround in his second season at the helm. NC State went 15‑12 overall, including 6‑8 in the ACC, and received an at‑large bid into the NCAA Tournament. A year ago, the Pack stayed home after going 11‑16 and winning just once in 14 league matches. The six conference wins set a new school record. NCSU beat seven ranked opponents after taking down just one in the spring of 2015. That included a pair of top‑30 triumphs, the first time since 2011 that happened. The 14 regular‑season wins tied for the third most in school history, one behind the 1998 and 2006 squads. The singles competitors collectively in‑ creased their wins total by 39 overall and 19 in ACC action. After being unranked in 2015, they finished the 2016 campaign at No. 40. The future looks bright, too. Six of the seven tennis players who competed in mul‑ tiple singles matches during ACC play are scheduled to be back — led by rising se‑ nior Martina Frantova, who competed in the NCAA Singles Championship and was ranked No. 45 nationally at the end of the year. Earnshaw also signed a pair of five‑ star recruits in Adrianna Reami and Anna Rogers. ■ Best Men's Team Win College wrestling teams do not typically go into Iowa City and emerge from a dual against Iowa victorious. Prior to NCSU's ar‑ rival for the NWCA National Duals Cham‑ pionship Series, Iowa had a 233‑22 all‑time record at Carver‑Hawkeye Arena (.914 win‑ ning percentage). NC State handed the Hawkeyes their 23rd loss. The Pack also gave the perennial power its first‑ever defeat to an ACC program in 13 matches. The second‑ranked Hawkeyes had a slim 11‑9 lead at the halfway point, but junior 165‑pounder Max Rohskopf put the Pack in front with a 6‑3 decision. The teams then traded the lead and matches until the culmi‑ nating heavyweight match. Down 17‑15, NC State only needed se‑ nior heavyweight Nick Gwiazdowski to win against sixth‑ranked Sam Stoll. Many of the 6,056 fans in attendance began leaving at that point, understanding the inevitable outcome. Gwiazdowski jumped out to a 10‑1 lead before Stoll injury defaulted, giving the Pack six points and a 21‑17 win in the dual. ■ Best Women's Team Win For the second straight year, the honor goes to the NC State women's basketball team for defeating a Duke squad. This year the win was at Cameron Indoor Stadium, a venue where NC State had not won since 1996. The Pack was unranked at the time, snapping Duke's 152‑game home winning streak against unranked opponents. In a back‑and‑forth affair against then‑ No. 22 Duke, the Devils had a 55‑53 lead midway through the fourth quarter when NCSU ended the contest on a 12‑7 run. Red‑ shirt junior guard Dominique Wilson helped seal the win by calmly making a pair of free throws with State up 63‑62 and five seconds left in the game. Wilson led the Pack with 19 points in the game for her 50th career double‑digit scor‑ ing output. Last season during an emotional Hoops 4 Hope game in Raleigh, the Pack defeated No. 10 Duke, 72‑59. ■ Best Upset Win Despite going 18‑14 overall and 5‑7 in the ACC, undisputedly the toughest conference in college men's tennis (NCSU faced 11 conference opponents that were ranked at the time), the Wolfpack did not receive an at‑large bid into the NCAA Championships. However, Jon Choboy's squad did make a bit of history in the spring when they up‑ set No. 7 Wake Forest (4‑3) on the road in Winston‑Salem, N.C. It represented the first time State had upset a top‑10 opponent since they defeated archrival No. 6 UNC in the second round of the NCAA Championships in 2007. After taking the doubles point from Wake, the Deacs won three of the first five singles matches to even the score at 3‑3. The result Junior 184-pounder Pete Renda finished third at the NCAA Championships. PHOTO BY LARRY BLANKENSHIP