Last week, five Oberlin College athletes were honored with North Coast Athletic Conference Athlete of the Week. Track and field’s fourth-year Anna Fritz and, fourth-year Namu Makatiani, women’s tennis’s second-year Eva Lopez, men’s tennis’s first-year Dash Smith, and men’s basketball’s fourth-year Zach Smith all performed exceptionally well in their respective sports, earning them well-deserved honors.
On Feb. 14, Anna Fritz made history at the Track and Field All-Ohio Championships, breaking Oberlin Athletics’ longstanding long jump record and earning her the overall win in the event as well as NCAC Athlete of the Week honors. On the day, Fritz jumped 5.56 meters in the long jump, shattering the previous record of 5.48 meters set by Annie Goodridge in 2016. The jump ranks second in the NCAC this season.
“It feels very special to be honored in this way,” Fritz wrote in an email to the Review. “I have been training long jump since my freshman year (with plenty of ups and downs in training along the way), so it feels incredibly rewarding to finally see the results that I have been working toward.”
Fritz has put in a lot of hard work this season refining the art of jumping — whether that be in long jump, triple jump, or hurdles.
“This season, I have given special focus to my technique,” Fritz wrote. “It has been a matter of putting together all the pieces from my previous years of training by combining techniques learned in different jump drills, meeting with my coaches to dissect my form in long jump recordings, and figuring out mental cues that allow me to properly engage during competitions.”
Fritz competes in the NCAC Championships tonight, hoping to continue seeing the product of her hard work.
Another Oberlin track and field athlete, College fourth-year Namu Makatiani, was honored following his impressive performance at the Music City Challenge at Vanderbilt University. The lone representative of Oberlin College, Makatiani impressed as one of few Division III athletes competing against a sea of D1 competitors. At the challenge, he reset his own program record in the triple jump, soaring 14.81 meters and earning sixth place overall. Makatiani’s jump improves his ranking to eighth nationally in D3 and best in the conference.
“It’s always wonderful to see hard work pay off in the form of accolades,” Head Coach Ben Wach wrote in an email to the Review. “But we work hard because the work itself has value, not necessarily to win medals and honors.”
Despite that, the honors can also be meaningful to the team as a whole.
“Having [Fritz and Makatiani’s] performances recognized at the conference level shows everyone that success is possible when you put the time and effort into your practice,” Wach wrote.
Makatiani, in addition to Fritz, hopes to continue his success today at the NCAC Indoor Championships.
Another player who received the honor is first-time NCAC Athlete of the Week recipient first-year Dash Smith, who received the award in the second week of his career. Smith swept his weekend matches against Rhodes College, Lake Forest College, and the University of Rochester, going 3–0 in singles matches. Competing in the No. 3 lineup spot, he defeated his Rhodes counterpart 6–4, 6–4 in a 4–3 team victory, and won the Lake Forest match 4–6, 6–0, 1–0 (10–5). Then, competing in the No. 2 spot, he won 5–7, 6–3, 7–5 against Rochester, contributing to a 5–2 win at home.
“Now that I’m playing in college, everybody is really consistent,” Smith remarked. “A lot of the guys that I’m playing are a little older, so they have a lot of experience against more opponents. I’m trying to adapt to be more consistent and be able to go out and play these long matches weekend after weekend, stay healthy, and stay excited.”
Despite having to make an adjustment to collegiate tennis, Smith has enjoyed some of the perks of being on a college team.
“I think I found a lot of joy in playing on a team,” Smith said. “Playing in high school, I was just playing individually, and now I’m representing the school and the team. Every match I play, I feel like I’m out there representing all the guys on the team, and it really pumps me up and gets me excited to play.”
Smith and the tennis team compete again this weekend against Hope College and Kalamazoo College, looking to continue this season’s early success.
For the first time in her career, second-year Eva Lopez was honored with NCAC Athlete of the Week honors, following her strong performance in the Oberlin women’s tennis team’s opening match against Rochester University. In a 4–3 team victory, Lopez went undefeated on the day, winning the No. 1 seeded doubles match 6–4 with her teammate, second-year Scarlett Kingston, as well as the No. 4 singles match 6–4, 7–6.
“[NCAC Athlete of the Week] was a big honor,” Lopez said. “I was extremely happy to get it. I wasn’t expecting it. I was very happy and proud because I feel like I put in a lot of work over Winter Term to be ready for this season.”
Since then, Lopez has continued to perform well. Despite the team losing 6–1 to Ohio Northern University, in a 4–3 win against Kalamazoo College, Lopez and Kingston won their doubles match 6–4, and Lopez went on to win the No. 3 seed match 4–6, 6–4, 7–5. For Lopez, winning the third set was important not just for the team, but also personally.
“That was a big success for me because usually with those third sets they tend to be pretty long,” Lopez said. “It was good for me to keep up my endurance through that whole match. I was proud of the way I played.”
Lopez hopes to keep the ball rolling this Sunday in a doubleheader against Saint Mary’s College and University of Saint Francis in Indiana.
The final athlete to be honored was fourth-year Zach Smith, who notched seven 20-plus-point games this season. At the Black History Month Hype Game, he scored a team-best 24 points, and in Oberlin’s first win against Wittenberg University since 1999, he added 12 points. Combined, the two performances earned him NCAC Athlete of the Week.
In the following games, he continued to perform well, scoring 21 points in a 65–60 win against Wabash College in the last regular season game. Additionally, in the teams’ playoff game against John Carroll University, Smith recorded 16 points and seven rebounds despite the 77–73 loss.
The loss against John Carroll marked both the end of the team’s season and the end of Smith’s athletic career.
“My main goal as a collegiate basketball player coming to Oberlin was just to improve,” Smith wrote in an email to the Review. “My freshman year, I didn’t play much. Sophomore year, I embraced my role as a shooter off the bench. Junior year, I earned a starting spot — and I think this season speaks for itself. Looking back on my career year by year, I couldn’t have asked for anything more, and I attribute it all to the hard work I’ve put in.”
Smith ends his career as a part of the winningest basketball class in the program’s history. Despite just winning eight games in 2022 — his freshman year — over the course of his four years, the team won a whopping 48 games.
