Argentina soccer top sports story of 2022; AU volleyball and men's basketball leading AU stories
Staff report
Students in the Fall 2022 Sports Communication course at Augusta University have voted Argentina’s winning the World Cup as the top sports story of the year.
The Argentines defeated defending champion France on penalty kicks on Sunday, Dec. 18, in Qatar to win their third World Cup. Lionel Messi, who has been a superstar in the sport for two decades, mainly with FC Barcelona, finally got his World Cup title. Kylian Mbappé of France scored three goals in the final, one better than Messi. Argentina won the penalty kicks, 4-2. The next World Cup will be held in Canada, Mexico and the United States. One of the stadium sites will be in Atlanta.
In other stories, students narrowly chose the AU volleyball team’s first-ever regular-season Peach Belt Conference championship over the Jaguar men’s basketball team’s NCAA Division II runner-up as the university’s sports story of the year, with the Augusta men’s cross-country team advancing to the NCAA Division II nationals as the third-place story.
For Georgia as a whole, the University of Georgia’s national championship in football claimed honors. The only other sports story in the state to get votes was former Bulldog Herschel Walker losing his U.S. Senate bid to incumbent Raphael Warnock.
The top story in the Southeast was the most contested category. The Atlanta Braves winning their first straight National League East championship was first, but other contenders included Tennessee edging Alabama in football; the death of Mississippi State football coach Mike Leach; Tom Brady’s retirement and then return to the Tampa Bay Bucs’ roster; and internal chemistry issues with the Atlanta Hawks.
The top American story was former Atlanta Brave Dusty Baker and his Houston Astros winning the World Series. Runner-up was the release of WNBA center Brittney Griner in prisoner swap with Russia.
The Sports Communication students voted men’s basketball’s Tyshaun Crawford the AU athlete of the year, with track/cross-country’s Kai Brickey as runner-up. Crawford led AU to its program-best 33-win season before losing to Northwest Missouri State in the NCAA Divisional II final in Evansville, Ind. He had 25 points and 14 rebounds in the national semifinal against Indiana University of Pennsylvania. In that game, he made all 12 of his field goal attempts. Brickey repeated as the Peach Belt Conference men’s cross-country champion and led the Jaguars to the nationals in Seattle. He also had a sterling outdoor track season, earning all-region honors with his performance in the 800 meters.
The female athlete of the year for the university was volleyball’s Jazmyn Wheeler, followed by teammate Alexis Diaz Infante. Both made the all-region team, and Wheeler was honorable mention all-America. They, of course, led AU to the PBC championship and a No. 2 seed in the Southeast Regional.
The international female athlete of the year was 400-meter star Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, who set a world record in winning the world championship, and male athlete of the year around the globe was pole vaulter Mondo Duplantis, who set the world record four times (which now is 20 feet, 4.5 inches). Duplantis was born in Louisiana but now lives in Sweden.
The most troubling stories of the year included: (1) the emergence of the Saudi-backed LIV professional golf league, and its division with the PGA Tour; (2) the chaos created by NIL and the transfer portal in major college sports; and (3) the Miami Dolphins not taking quarterback Tua Tagovailoa out of a game with the Buffalo Bills when he clearly sustained a concussion—and he would be lifted after sustaining a horrible head hit against the Cincinnati Bengals a few weeks later that sent him to a hospital.
Voters: Kai Brickey, Michael Fortino, Madison Keel, Joshua Picklesimer, Aaron Smith, Angela Stephan, Riley Triplett and Payton Willis.
Center Tyshaun Crawford led Augusta University to the championship game of the NCAA Division II men’s basketball tournament. At the top of the page, Jazmyn Wheeler shows her strength as she gets a kill while leading the Jaguars to the Peach Belt Conference regular-season title and earning all-America honors. (photos by Madison Keel)
