Nov 18, 2017 | News |
By Alicia Davis – Contributing Writer
The UMF Ultimate Disc team recently participated in the Lobster Pot Tournament at Wainwright Sports Complex in Portland, Maine.
The team played four games on Saturday and won three of them. Saturday was a calm, cool day, which helped UMF beat out most of their opponents. The weather conditions on Sunday were much more harsh, with high gusts of wind affecting the players’ ability to throw. Despite the weather, UMF played three games and won all three.
UMF Ultimate Disc team at the Lobster Pot Tournament in Portland
Photo Courtesy of Sam Carignan
Overall, the UMF ultimate team took 9th place out of the lower men’s division despite being seeded 15th place, breaking seed by 6 places. Joe Brichetto, a UMF senior who will be playing his fourth year of ultimate, felt that the team worked well as a unit, which helped them be successful at the Lobster Pot.
“This is the best tournament the team has played at since my freshman year,” said Brichetto. “It was really vindicating for the senior players to now be the leaders who helped carry the team to victory.”
Sam Carignan, who will be in his third year playing ultimate, felt that this tournament was an important one for the team. “This weekend helped bind us together as a team,” he said.
Like Brichetto, Carignan also believed that the team worked well together. “I’m very proud of the team both on and off the field, because not only did we play physically well, but we kept the high ground and stuck with a good attitude,” he said.
Dan Abbatello, who will be playing his second year of ultimate, felt that this year’s Lobster Pot went much smoother for the team than last years.
“This year we played a lot better because we had a lot more numbers,” said Abbatello. “Last year, we went to the Lobster Pot with eight players, and seven played on the field. Having 15 players come down to the tournament this year really helped.”
Abbatello believed that the tournament was great for new players on the team. “This weekend was full of experience for our new players, giving them the chance to play at a competitive level,” he said.
“Ultimate is always looking for new members of any skill level,” said Brichetto.
Practices take place 3:30-5:30 Monday through Friday on Prescott Field. Practices are optional, so people can still play even if they do not go to all of the practices. For more information, contact co-presidents Cory McCullough at cory.mccullough@maine.edu or Tim Pacini at timothy.pacini@maine.edu.
Nov 18, 2017 | Sports |
By Devin Lachapelle – Contributing Writer
Led by three individual top-ten performances for the women and two individual top-ten performances for the men, UMF’s women’s and men’s cross country teams earned second and third place finishes at the North Atlantic Conference Cross Country Championships, which took place in Farmington for the first time in ten years.
UMF’s top female runner was Katie LeBlanc, who placed second out of ninety-five total runners. Teammates Laura Pulito, Gwen Baker, Chloe Kenyon and Molly Jack finished fifth, eighth, twenty-third and twenty-fourth, respectively.
UMF’s best male runner of the day was Jeremiah Sands, who finished second in a field of eighty-five. Robbie Hollis finished in eighth, while David Doering, Cory McCullough, and Connor Marland rounded out the rest of UMF’s scoring positions at eighteenth, thirtieth and thirty-third.
The NAC Championships were held on the Mt. Blue High School campus in Farmington, which Hollis, a captain of the men’s team, said was to the advantage of the UMF runners.
“It’s a slow course, considering the hills, and mentally we knew we would have that edge as a team if we trained here,” he said.
Hollis, in his fourth year at UMF, said he was excited that Farmington had the chance to host such a big event. “There’s a set schedule where it’s decided where the North Atlantic Conference meet is held each year,” he said, “and it was good to see that NACs were going to be held here my senior year.”
UMFs Robbie Hollis approaches the finish line as assistant coach Moninda Morube (left) watches.
Photo Courtesy of Devin Lachapelle
Pulito, a captain of the women’s team, agreed with Hollis and said that much of both teams’ conditioning activities involve exercises designed specifically for the trail system at Mt. Blue. “This is our home course, so we train on it all season and we know it really well,” she said. “We do a lot of hill workouts because there are so many hills on this course.”
Pulito mentioned that preparation for races is not only physical but also mental. “We do a lot of visualization where we sit in a circle and [coach Dan Campbell] brings us through the race,” she said, “and we sit there with our eyes closed and picture the whole thing.”
Moninda Marube, an assistant coach of both the men’s team and the women’s team, said that he was extremely pleased with the tenacity shown by his runners during the race.
“Mentally and emotionally they’re very strong,” he said. “They worked hard; I saw them push, and it really worked out.”
Marube emphasized that his role as a coach was that of a supportive mentor and that the UMF runners deserved most of the credit for the team’s success.
“My purpose is to help them focus and not be nervous,” he said. “They prepared themselves very well. I’m impressed.”
The women’s and men’s teams will both be participating in the NCAA New England Regional Championships in Gorham, Maine later this month.
Full results from the NAC Cross Country Championships and details about the upcoming NCAA Regional meet can be found at http://athletics.umf.maine.edu/sports/wxc/2017-18/schedule for the women and http://athletics.umf.maine.edu/sports/mxc/2017-18/schedule for the men.
Nov 18, 2017 | News |
By Bryan Eldridge – Contributing Writer
UMF students all around campus transformed from their everyday selves into entirely new identities as costumes arose from the dead for another year of the spectacular Halloween Dance.
Every year, UMF holds a Halloween themed dance for students to help get into the holiday spirit and give creative minds on campus a spotlight during a fun and popular time of year. While many shared the intent of going to the dance, almost nobody arrived with the exact same costume.
“I thought it was really interesting to see all the different variations,” said Katie Franke, a UMF freshman dressed as Daphne from Scooby-Doo. “Some people came up with really creative costume ideas.”
The dance is often a great time for many friends to get together for the same event. “I liked how so many people came together,” said Franke. “It wasn’t just some event where no one showed up, everyone was there,” Franke said with enthusiasm.
Franke’s residence hall, Mallett, was one of many to hold fun social events before the dance to keep the students excited about the evening.
“We carved pumpkins, we played [ping] pong with skeletons, we had snacks and people talked [with one another]” Franke added.
Harry Potter even made the cut at the dance, as Dolores Umbridge was found within Mallett Hall. Tommy Hainsworth found the costume very fitting for the popular movie hit.
Tom Cruise from Risky Business and a friendly scarecrow shared a laugh together before they grooved their way into the Halloween Dance. For these two, the stress relief was a much-needed break from everyday life.
“Our favorite part was letting loose and having fun!” said Preston, a first-year student at UMF through an online forum.
The wide variety of costumes at the dance is something that many students look forward to each year and is what often brings them back. Rebecca Reed and Hope Faulkingham, both freshman this year, found this particularly true.
“I had fun with my friends. I think I would go back again next year to see the wide variety of costumes,” said Reed.
“I really wanted to go because it seemed like a lot of people were going and it seemed like fun!” Faulkingham exclaimed with excitement.
Three referees found themselves officiating the noise and excitement levels as they made their own rulings at the dance.
From L to R: Ian Kelly, Spencer Wilkinson, and Bryan Eldridge made their call on this year’s dance.
Photo Courtesy of Rebecca Reed
The dance takes place each year at UMF around Halloween time and is sure to be an event you don’t want to miss. For more photos and videos from this year’s dance, visit the Entertainment Redefined Facebook page. https://www.facebook.com/ERTour/
Nov 18, 2017 | News |
By Gwen Baker – Contributing Writer
A diverse group of Farmington community members came together at UMF to hold a vigil for the victims of a truck bombing in Mogadishu Somalia.
After hearing about this news, Mana Mohamed, a senior majoring in Political Science and minoring in International and Global Studies, felt compelled to do something about it.
With a large community of Somali students attending UMF, many were directly impacted by this news. Mohamed felt it was disheartening that so many were uninformed about such a big event.
Nov 18, 2017 | News |
By Kelsey Dunn – Contributing Writer
Students were recently treated to a collaboration of UMF’s Lawn Chair Pirates (LCP), Bust A Move Beavers (BAM), and Clefnotes called “Pirates Bust a Clef” in Lincoln Auditorium. This collaboration has not happened in years, making the performance more surprising and enjoyable.
Each group is different in their own way and brings UMF an extra flare. BAM expresses themselves through dance styles such as tap, hip hop, clogging, and lyrical. LCP is UMF’s talented improv comedy group, bringing laughter to Lincoln Auditorium regularly. Clefnotes is UMF’s pop vocalist group, singing current and popular songs that students can all sing along to.
While students were filling up Lincoln Auditorium, some students sang along to the music that was playing beforehand. BAM members started to clap to a song and urged the crowd to join in. Soon, the room was filled with a rhythmic beat. The three distinctive groups were dressed in different colors; LCP wore red shirts, BAM wore black and Clefnotes wore their white club shirts.
“We spent a long time figuring out how this would all work out because we weren’t around when it happened in the past,” said Josh Beckett, a junior and co-leader of Clefnotes. “We spent a long time trying to figure out the order of who should perform, but LCP and BAM are easy to work with and really fun.”
“BAM was asked to do the event with LCP and Clefnotes,” said Paige Morrison, a senior BAM member. “Our dance routines were from the past semester dances, so nothing new was revealed before our upcoming shows.”
“Pirates Bust a Clef” started with BAM’s opening number, with the Pirates cheering them on and the crowd roaring in applause. The next performance came from LCP, who played three games; Four Square, Bachelor and Sniper. All three games made the audience laugh so much that they were crying. BAM then came back with a great performance, followed by Clefnotes performing seven songs back to back; Marvin Gay, Say You Won’t Go, Eleven Blocks, Say You Love Me, Counting Stars, Put Your Records On and Skinny Love.
The soloists captivated the crowd, including senior Krystal Livermore. “Most of their songs were really good,” she said, though she lamented one song where it was hard to hear the soloist.
LCP mixed some of their roles up, which threw Livermore off. “They mixed up the people who do their original skits. For example, in Sniper, Jonas [Maines] wasn’t the main guy like he usually is,” Livermore said.
“Pirates Bust a Clef” ended with Clefnotes singing Boondocks by Little Big Town and LCP and BAM joining them up on stage. Everyone was dancing and singing along; it was noticeable that both the audience and the performers had enjoyed their night.
Jonas Maines, a junior LCP member, believed the collaboration was a worthwhile experience. “It was a good experience to get three types of different artistic performances together,” he said. “It is to everyone’s benefit when three different styles come together to see what we all do.”
Livermore loved going to the event because she hasn’t been able to go to a Clefnotes showcase. “I loved the three in one because sometimes it’s hard to attend all of these events when we are so busy,” she said. “It was really great to get to see all three groups perform.”
