Richard Rokos Letter To Skiing Supporters

Dear CU Skiing Supporter,

Wow! What a season! As we begin off-season meetings this month and the scheduling process to prepare for the 2020 season, which will be my 30th as head coach, I thought it prudent to keep you up to date with all that happened this past season in 2019.

While rumors of last season being my final season were premature to say the least, we did say goodbye to Jodi Mossoni, who retired after 17 seasons of being the glue that held the program together. From helping with numerous Ski Balls and four NCAA Championships, to her day-to-day duties, her tireless efforts will be missed. We are excited to welcome Sheryl Voth, who has been with the department for over a decade working in various departments. She will be an invaluable asset to our team and ski family. 66555

The 2019 season saw a few changes on the coaching staff, as longtime and legendary Nordic coach Bruce Cranmer retired after a combined 30 seasons at Vermont and here with the Buffs. Did you know that in the 30 seasons Bruce was coaching, in 29 seasons one of the top two Nordic teams at the NCAA Championships were coached by either Bruce or one of his former student-athletes? What an amazing feat.

We are lucky that Jana Weinberger, who is both a former skier and assistant under Bruce, took over as Nordic coach and had a very successful first season. We were also fortunate to hire Austin Caldwell as assistant Nordic coach. While the Caldwell name hasn't been included in the rich tradition of CU history until now, he and his family certainly have deep roots in Nordic skiing in the United States.

Jana and Austin successfully continued our recent success on the Nordic side and that team scored the second most points at the NCAA Championships and the men's team outscored all competition at NCAAs, helped by freshman Erik Dengerud, who won the school's 97th individual national championship when he won the freestyle race on the first day of the championships. He and senior Alvar Alev both earned two All-America honors in leading the Buffs at the championship.

Not to be outdone, the women's Nordic team also had a tremendously successful season. They scored the second-most points in our conference, the RMISA, throughout the season. Sophomore Hedda Baangman and Anne Siri Lervik both won races and Baangman, the RMISA's Women's Nordic MVP, earned a podium appearance at the NCAAs by finishing third in the classic race. Senior Christina Rolandsen picked up two All-America honors at NCAAs, as well.
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We were hit by the injury bug on the alpine side this past season. Two of our women's skiers, Isabelle Fidjeland and Megan McGrew, missed the entire season. Despite that, we put together a successful season. Freshman Mikaela Tommy proved why she's one of the top giant slalom skiers in the world by becoming the first women's alpine skier in CU history to win her first three races in one discipline in her career. The only time she didn't finish first in a GS race was at NCAAs, but she still managed two first-team All-America honors.

Mikaela missed a few college races while skiing at the highest level in the world, the World Cup, where she had her three best career finishes including two top 20 performances. Shortly after the NCAA Championships, she won and was second in two North American Cup races, which are the second highest level in the world. Those podium performances were key and will enable to her to remain ranked as one of the top 35 skiers in the world headed into next year.

Newcomer Stef Fleckenstein, who overcame injuries herself last fall and joined the team in January, steadily improved and ended her season with an All-America performance at NCAAs. With those two and five of the other six skiers returning next season, the future is bright for us.

On the men's side, it would be dishonest to say we didn't struggle in 2019 but there were silver linings in those struggles and we came out of the season mentally tougher and ready for our challenges next season. Our team captain Bobby Moyer showed more courage than most trying to ski through injuries, I can't say enough good things about him. Through it all, he performed his captainship with honor and dignity. 66553

Freshmen Filip Forejtek and Teddy Takki both showed signs of brilliance while adjusting to life in the unusual world of team skiing. Filip injured his hand the first race of the season and was bothered by it the rest of the year, but in two GS races in Alaska at the end of the season, he had two top five finishes. Takki also had two top 10 finishes early in the season in GS. Just a sophomore, Joey Young took on a leadership role and responded by being our most consistent skier finishing outside the top 15 just one time in 14 races and he also won his first career race at New Mexico.

I would be remiss if I didn't recognize the efforts of my alpine assistant coach, Stefan Hughes, who finished his second season with me. We are fortunate to now have that position better funded moving forward. In the past, it's been a nine-month temporary position.

We are always sad to lose our seniors, and this season is no different. Nora Christensen, Max Luukko and Christina Rolandsen were all four-year skiers and all multiple-time All-Americans. More than that, they are all great people and proud Buffs. We also lose Alvar who skied for two seasons, which is a bonus because we thought we may only have him for one season. Bobby will also retire from ski racing a season early.

May is the time of graduation and it was amazing to see Nora, Max and Christina all graduate joined by Ola Johansen and Tonje Trulsrud, who both continued with their education and successfully completed their degrees this past academic year despite only having three seasons of eligibility from the NCAA.

And speaking of academics, this season we continued our tradition of great academic accomplishment. A total of 10 members of the team earned honors on the National Collegiate All-Academic Ski Team. Nora and Max both earned the honor for the fourth time in their careers. The academic ski team has the highest requirements of any such team in the country, with a minimum 3.5 grade point average and participation at the regional championships being necessary for inclusion on the team. 66558

At the annual Academic Breakfast, the ski team was well represented. The women's team had the highest GPA of any women's team on campus and was honored as such, with a cumulative GPA over 3.4 among the 13 women's skiers on the roster. Max Luukko was honored as having the highest GPA among all CU senior male student-athletes across all sports. Tonje, Christina and Erik all earned perfect 4.0 GPAs in at least one semester in 2018 and Isabelle was given the Clancy A. Herbst Student-Athlete Achievement Award for overcoming adversity.

At the annual CUSPY awards, we were also represented well as Erik won the Male Athlete of the Year award and Mikaela was the Female Freshman of the Year across all sports. At our annual banquet, we gave out the team awards and a total of 17 letters. We have the toughest requirements for earning a varsity letter in the department and I want to congratulate Max and Nora for earning the fourth letter of their careers, a true testament to their consistency and excellence over the past four years.

In all, we earned 11 All-America honors, moving the program total over the 500 mark (now 509) and we earned five first-team All-America honors and in our history we're approaching 300 of those honors (now at 297). Erik's individual National Championship gives us 97, more than any other team in the nation, and he also won the RMISA Individual Championship in the freestyle race which marked our 122nd all-time individual regional championship honor. We had eight All-RMISA performers and Hedda won the RMISA MVP for women's Nordic. We also had nine CU Athlete of the Week honors and six RMISA Skiers of the Week.
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As we look ahead into a new decade, the fourth in which I will coach, we are also putting to rest one of the most successful decades in CU skiing history. From 2010-19, we won three National Championships, finished second four times, third twice and fourth once. We had two more top two and top three finishes than any other team in the country and our average finish of 2.10 at NCAA Championships was the best nationally. It marked the first time since our historic run of eight straight National Championships in the 1970s that we can call ourselves the Team of the Decade.

In fact, since 2006, we have four National Championships and haven't finished lower than fourth at the NCAAs with six second place finishes, three third place finishes and one fourth place. In that 14 year span, no other team has more than 10 finishes in the top four. We have also hosted four successful NCAA Championships at Steamboat Springs in those 14 years, serving as host more than any other team in the nation, another fact we can be proud of at CU that we have the institutional support to pull that off.

As we look forward to next year, we will be busy recruiting over the summer. Next fall will look a little different as we will hold our 49th Annual Ski Ball on September 13 at the Omni Interlocken Hotel, earlier than normal. This season we will be honoring all 20 of our National Championship teams and we hope you can make it to Boulder to help us celebrate.

Ski Ball Registration

Sincerely,