Now that we have a lull between the fall and winter sports seasons, it's a good time to catch up on some more area athletes who have gone on to play sports at the college level.
We mentioned some of these people a month or so ago and have some updates, and we also have some new people to mention now that colleges have begun their winter sports seasons.
Shamokin Area graduate Tim Bousson closed out his football career at Wilkes University in a big way. He was named Wilkes MVP in the school's annual Mayor's Cup game against Kings College. He caught seven passes for 125 yards and a touchdown in a 27-21 loss. It was the third straight game in which Bousson, who missed all but one game in 2013 with an injury, caught seven passes, and he ended the season as the Colonels' leading receiver with 41 catches for 512 yards and three touchdowns. For his career, Bousson had 65 catches for 857 yards and five TDs.
We also should mention starting offensive lineman Lucas Amarose from Mount Carmel, who we missed when we checked the Colonels' roster last time.
Also missed was Jonathan Vaneskie, a Shamokin graduate who was a regular starter for the mens soccer team at Penn State Harrisburg this season.
Last time, we talked about Notre Dame tight end Ben Koyack, and his Coal Township roots. This time, we'll talk about University of Iowa quarterback Jake Rudock, whose paternal grandparents, Robert and Peg, live on East Avenue in Mount Carmel. Rudock played high school football at St. Thomas Aquinas in Broward County, Fla., where he was Florida Sun-Sentinel Player of the Year as a senior in 2010. In the past two seasons at Iowa, Rudock has passed for 4,246 yards and 30 touchdowns, with another 345 yards and seven touchdowns rushing. He is a redshirt junior this season.
Another guy we missed last time is Mount Carmel graduate Tyler Kwiatkowski, who is on the football team at Columbia University.
Another Mount Carmel graduate, Elijah Duran, scored his first collegiate touchdown for Occidental College in California in a game against Redlands. A sophomore, Duran caught five passes for 56 yards on the season.
On the running beat, former state cross country and 3200-meter run champion Brendan Shearn of North Schuylkill finished 33rd overall in the recent NCAA Division I Mid-Atlantic Regional race at Penn State for the University of Pennsylvania.
Mount Carmel graduates Mikael and Lauren Hause, running for Misericordia University, finished seventh and 22nd, respectively, at the Middle Atlantic Conference championships at Lebanon Valley College.
Former Southern Columbia soccer standouts Bailey Bzdak and Teanna Shutt recently completed their freshman seasons at Shippensburg University and Lebanon Valley College, respectively. Bzdak scored two goals and an assist for the Division II Raiders, and Shutt scored eight goals and had two assists for the Division III Flying Dutchmen.
As stated earlier, the winter season has already started at the college level, and two sophomores who had big freshman seasons last year are off to good starts as sophomores. Lourdes Regional gradute Nikki Komara is averaging 13.8 points, 5.8 rebounds and a team-leading 5.8 assists per game for Susquehanna University through the first four games of the season. She's coming off a season in which she averaged 11.9 points and 7.3 rebounds per game.
Lycoming College wrestler and Line Mountain graduate Seth Lansberry has started the season with a 10-2 record, including six pins, wrestling at 149 pounds for the Warriors. Last season, Lansberry was 35-10 with eight pins.
And back at Susquehanna. a number of area graduates are on the roster for the indoor track season. On the roster are Shamokin graduates Renea Broscious, Matt Gass and Brandon Mendoza, Southern Columbia grads Jansen Ring, Tom Schetroma and Andrew Steely, and Mount Carmel graduates Mackenzie Greco and Justin Skavery.