March 2, 2016

All-Heartland Conference release

BLUFFTON, Ohio - Four members of the Bluffton University women's basketball team received postseason honors when the Heartland Conference handed out its top awards on Wednesday, March 2. Sophomore Macey Sheerer (Bucyrus) and junior Rachel Beining (Ottoville) were both named First Team All-Heartland Conference, the first time in school history that Bluffton has placed two women on the First Team. Sophomore Kaycee Rowe (Harrod/Allen East) earned Second Team All-HCAC honors in her first full season as a Beaver. Senior floor general Taylor Knight (Perrysburg) was selected Honorable Mention for the second consecutive season.

Picking up his first Heartland Conference Coach of the Year award was Bluffton University Head Coach Chad Shutler. Back-to-back seasons of setting school marks for wins in a season helped Coach Shutler to his first piece of post-season hardware. He became the all-time winningest coach in Bluffton women's basketball history in January and is currently at 130 career victories. An 18-0 start that smashed the previous high-water mark of six straight wins in a season helped the Beavers break the school record for wins in a season for the second consecutive year. Bluffton jumped over the previous mark of 16 with 18 wins last season and obliterated it with 25 heading into the first-ever NCAA Tournament game for a Bluffton women's team.

He guided the women to their first-ever regular-season championship in the HCAC and proceeded to follow that up with the first-ever HCAC Tournament title. The Beavers made their inaugural appearances in the national Top 25 for both the D3hoops.com and USA Today/Coaches polls. Bluffton is currently #17 in the USA Today poll, the highest ranking ever for a Bluffton basketball team. His 2015-16 seniors have set the bar high, rolling off 69 wins during their time at Bluffton, 18 more than the previous mark of 51 set just one season ago. Two of those six seniors, Taylor Whitaker (Mansfield/Lexington) and Kaitlyn Pennekamp (Hamilton/Ross) became the first duo from one class to eclipse 1,000 career points when they did it on back-to-back nights. And it all started when Coach Shutler came to Bluffton in 2005-06 and inherited a program that had gone 8-93 over the previous four years!

Bluffton's success as a team paid huge dividends when the All-Heartland Conference awards were handed out. Sophomore guard Macey Sheerer, who was named the 2014-15 HCAC Freshman of the Year, avoided a sophomore slump en route to being one of just six women named First Team All-HCAC. Sheerer led the Heartland with a 54.5 field goal percentage (116-of-213) which places her in a tie for 4th all-time at Bluffton. She also topped the Beavers with 12.0 PPG and 7.6 RPG. Sheerer was the HCAC Player of the Week after she led Bluffton to early-season victories over Kalamazoo and Heidelberg. The versatile guard is already ninth on the career list with 223 makes at the stripe and she is tied for third with a .796 career free throw percentage (223-280). Her 205 free throws this season are tied for eighth on the all-time list for a single season.

Talented post Rachel Beining secured a rare daily double for the Beavers, earning First Team All-HCAC honors just four days after being named to the Heartland Conference All-Tournament Team. Beining punished opponents in the key and she was also proficient with her mid-range jumper, forcing defenses to pick their poison. Like Sheerer, Beining was named HCAC Player of the Week after pacing the Beavers in December victories over Earlham and Rose-Hulman. Beining's 206 rebounds rank 7th all-time for a single season while her 7.6 RPG were fifth in the conference. She nearly doubled her number of free throw attemps from 2014-15 and converted 73-of-90 (81.1 percent) which is 12th all time for free throw percentage. Her 50 blocks are tied for fifth on the single-season chart. Beining also made her mark on the career lists, moving up to 17th on the all-time scoring ledger with 797 tallies. Her 320 career field goals are 14th all-time while her .490 field goals percentage is seventh. With a 74.4 free throw percentage, Beining jumped up to 13th all-time. She is currently sixth all-time with 578 rebounds and her 125 blocks are third on the career list. Beining is on pace for nearly 800 career boards with Kim Miller currently the all-time leader (697 rebounds).

Kaycee Rowe joined the Beavers midway through the 2014-15 campaign and she has been an integral part in Bluffton's success the past two years. The multi-faceted sophomore is able to hit from distance as well as get to the rack. She came up one shy of the school record with five triples in Bluffton's win over Franklin and her ability to score in the paint causes matchup headaches for opposing defenses. Her 36.9 field goal percentage from outside the arc (13th all-time) was a nice complement to her 80.2 free throw percentage. She also picked up a team-best 49 steals and dished out 79 assists, second only to Taylor Knight. She ranked third for Bluffton with 11.1 PPG and 6.7 RPG.

Taylor Knight was selected Honorable Mention All-HCAC for her toughness and leadership on the court. She scored 7.4 points per contest and was much more of a threat off the dribble during her senior campaign. Knight was third in the conference with 117 assists (2nd all-time for a Bluffton single season) and was fifth in the conference with an assist-to-turnover ratio of 1.6. Knight also picked up 36 steals on the season. Her 375 assists are second on the career list to Kim Miller's 412 dimes. Knight's 256 free throws are currently sixth all-time, while her 74.9 free throw percentage (256-342) is 10th on the career list. Knight has played in 104 games, second to fellow senior Taylor Whitaker's 105 games, and she recently surpassed Tanya Rickenberg for the most starts in Bluffton women's history with her 102nd start in the HCAC championship game!

Bluffton senior MARINA LYONS (Springfield/Catholic) was recognized by the HCAC as a member of the All-Conference Sportsmanship team for the 2015-16 season. The award has been developed as part of a conference-wide sportsmanship initiative. Members of the All-HCAC Sportsmanship team are selected by the coaches and their teammates as individuals who demonstrate the ideals of positive sportsmanship both on and off the court.

-BEAVERS-