On This Date: Track & Field Sets Records at Penn Relays; Softball Trio Make Mark in Record Book

With the 2020 spring sports season canceled by the COVID-19 outbreak, we at Fordham have decided to dig back through our archives and provide our fans with content on some of the outstanding teams and student-athletes who have graced Rose Hill over the years
 
April 27, 1963 – It was a momentous day for the men's track & field team at the 1963 Penn Relays. The 4 x mile relay team of Matt Cucchiara, Norbert Sander, Joe McGovern, and Tom Kenney won the event in a world record time of 16:42.7.  Kenney blew away the competition on the anchor leg, running a blazing 4:04.9 split.
 
The mark still stands as the Fordham school record, and the group was honored at the Penn Relay Carnival in 2013 for the 50-year anniversary of their victory as inductees into the Wall of Fame, joining 2010 inductee Joe McCluskey.
 
Three of the four members are in the Fordham Athletics Hall of Fame (Cucchiara (2013), Sander (1995), Kenney (1991)).
 

April 27, 2003 – Former head coach Bridget Orchard (then Bridget Baxter) turned around the Fordham softball program upon her arrival in 2002. Following a sub-.500 season that initial year, the 2003 squad started a run of 17 consecutive seasons with 32 or more wins, starting with then-freshman Michelle Schlichtig and the 2003 Rams, who went 37-19 and 10-6 in conference play. On this date in history, Schlichtig tossed the program's first-ever perfect game (and no-hitter) over five innings at George Washington in a 12-0 win.
 
Schlichtig spent just one year in the Bronx, transferring after her freshman year to be closer to home, but it was truly a historic campaign. The perfect game wasn't the only first for her that season as she became the program's first Atlantic 10 Rookie of the Year, First Team All-Conference selection, and NFCA First Team All-Region member. Orchard took home the first of her six Coach of the Year awards, as well.
 
Schlichtig, the program's first deadly two-way player, went 22-9 in the circle with a 1.46 ERA over a league-leading 211.1 innings, striking out 176 with just 36 walks, and going the distance 24 times, with six shutouts, over 37 appearances and 31 starts. At the plate, she led the Rams with a .327 average, 31 RBIs, and 12 doubles.
 
April 27, 2011 – By now, Fordham fans who weren't around for her four-year reign of dominance have been caught up to speed with Fordham softball Hall of Famer Jen Mineau's brilliance. On this date nine years ago, Mineau fired her fourth career perfect game and seventh no-hitter against Saint Peter's. Mineau faced 15 batters and struck out 12 of them, inducing fly outs for the other three. Earlier in the day, Chelsea Plimpton was one hit away from a perfect game of her own, too.

 

Mineau struck out the side in the third and fourth innings and finished the game with a pair. The win was the 17^th of her junior campaign. She finished her season with a 24-9 record with a 1.22 ERA, the second-lowest mark in program history, with an even 300 strikeouts over 224.2 innings. She made 43 appearances, 28 starts, and notched 24 complete games, 15 shutouts, and four saves.
 
The Schaghticoke, N.Y. native rewrote the Fordham record book, setting 16 records including career marks for wins (101), strikeouts (1,390) and ERA (1.42). A three-time All-Region and Atlantic 10 All-Conference First Team honoree, she was twice honored as an NFCA All-American and with the Hobbs Family Award (Fordham's Female Student-Athlete of the Year). Academically, Mineau graduated Magna Cum Laude and was twice named an Academic All-American® and A-10 Scholar Athlete of the Year. In 2019, she took her appropriate place in the Fordham Athletics Hall of Fame.
 
April 27, 2013 – One of the most feared hitters in Fordham softball history, Elise Fortier, became the second Ram to hit three home runs in a single game on this date seven years ago. The program's all-time home run leader, Fortier reached base all five trips to the plate, going a perfect 4-of-4 with five runs batted in, three runs scored, a double, and a walk. The Rams defeated St. Bonaventure on the road, 6-5, following Fortier's go-ahead solo bomb in the top of the ninth.
 

Fortier walked in the first but was unable to score. Instead, she single-handedly powered the Rams to victory over the next six frames. Her two-run home run in the second put the visitors ahead, 2-0, but the Bonnies tied things up in the fourth. The tie was brief, though, as Fortier smashed a solo shot to dead center to put the Rams up once more. Fortier doubled in Jamie LaBovick in the seventh to extend their lead to three, but the Bonnies rallied to tie the game up in the bottom half of the inning. Batting leadoff in the ninth, Fortier pulled the go-ahead home run to left. Taylor Pirone worked around a hit and a hit by pitch to see out the victory, her second of the year.
 
Fortier arrived in the Bronx in 2012 after playing her freshman season at Stony Brook. In just three years, she hit 46 home runs, besting Jocelyn Dearborn's previous record of 45, and finished with a slash line of .336/.443/.695, the latter number also far and away the school record. Her 159 RBIs are second-most, while her 356 total bases, 40 doubles, and 98 walks are all fifth in the record book. Fortier started all 173 games during her time in the Bronx, helping the Rams to a pair of Atlantic 10 championships her final two years.
 

April 27, 2018 – It was a banner day for the Fordham track & field team in Philadelphia at the annual Penn Relays, as sophomore Ryan Kutch won the 10,000 meter run at Franklin Field in a record-breaking time of 29:43.54.

Kutch broke the school record of 29:56.3, previously set by Kevin Giannetti in 1985. The individual win was also the first by a Ram at the Penn Relays since Lauren Gubicza in 1992, and the first men's winner since Sam Perry in 1966.
 
Since then, Kutch has bettered his 10,000 meter record to 29:20.25 in 2019, while also holding the outdoor 5,000 meter record and the indoor 3,000 meter mark.