As a part of our 30th Anniversary celebration, the Peach Belt will take a year-by-year look at the events and stories that helped shape the league. The PBC Chronicle will be released six times during the 2020-21 academic year, each edition looking at a five-year stretch as we relive and remember the past 30 years. Part 1 looks at 1991-96.
1991-92
Coming to Fruition
The Peach Belt began with just men's and women's basketball in the 1990-91 season but became a full conference in 1991-92 as the league expanded to 11 sports with the addition of men's and women's cross country, men's soccer, volleyball, men's and women's tennis, baseball, softball and men's golf. Known initially as the Peach Belt Athletic Conference, the PBAC also expanded to eight schools for the 91-92 season with the addition of Augusta College (now Augusta University). The league began with seven charter members: Armstrong State University, Columbus State University, Francis Marion University, Georgia College, Lander University, USC Aiken and USC Upstate.
 |
|
| Marvin Vanover was named the first PBC Commissioner in 1991 |
|
In addition to adding sports and member institutions, the Peach Belt conducted its first series of PBC Championship Tournaments.
1991-92 Inaugural PBC Championships
Men's and Women's Cross Country - Hosted by USC Upstate - Men's Champion: USC Upstate; Women's Champion - Lander
Men's Soccer - Hosted by Lander; Champions - Lander
Volleyball - Hosted by Augusta; Champions - USC Aiken
Men's and Women's Basketball - Hosted by Augusta - Men's Champion: Columbus State; Women's Champion: Augusta
Men's Golf - Hosted by USC Aiken; Champions - Columbus State
Men's and Women's Tennis - Hosted by Armstrong State - Men's Champion: Lander; Women's Champion: Augusta
Softball - Hosted by Georgia College; Champions - USC Upstate
Baseball - Hosted by Columbus State; Champions - USC Aiken
Columbus State Captures Men's Golf National Championship
Less than a year after the full formation of the Peach Belt, Columbus State gave the conference its first national champion. The Cougars won what was their fourth title in program history at the time, but the first for the PBAC.
The tournament was hosted by Wofford College in Spartanbug, S.C., and the Cougars were in complete control, winning the event by 32 strokes over second-place Troy State. USC Aiken finished fifth in the 16-team field. Four players from that 1992 team - Scott Clark, Mark Immelman, Martin Lonardi and Diego Ventureira - would be named All-Americans that season
1991-92 Commissioner's Cup Champion
USC Upstate
PBC Hall of Famers first year of PBC activity: 1991-92
Marvin Vanover, Peach Belt
Dr. Robert Alexander, USC Aiken
Finis Horne, Lander
Joe Cabri, Lander
Hebert Greene, Columbus State
Mary Lisko, Augusta University
Joe Roberts, Armstrong State
Other 1991-92 Notables
Augusta's Jeff Hubrey and USC Upstate's Martha Cobo were named the first PBAC Scholar-Athletes of the Year. This award, along with the Commissioner's Cup, were the first two established by the new conference and are still presented today.
1992-93
Lander Begins Men's Tennis Title Run
 |
| The 1993 Lander men's tennis team |
The Lander Bearcars (then Senators) men's tennis team won the Division II National Championship in their first year as a full DII member. It would be the first of 8 straight national titles for the team, establishing them as one of the greatest dyansties in any sport in NCAA Division II history. Under the leadership of PBC Hall of Fame coach Dr. Joe Cabri, the Bearcats defeated Hampton 5-2 in the championship match which was played in Edmund, Oklahoma. The championship match was won by the LU doubles team of Lee Holyoak and Brett Simpson (now Lander's head coach), who won 6-1, 6-3 at #2 doubles.
The Bearcats shook up the Division II landscape, but those paying attention should not have been surpried as Lander had also won the NAIA national title in both 1991 and 1992. The championship was the second national title for the PBC in as many years.
FMU's Whitwell and Hirst Capture National Title
Francis Marion's Lee Whitwell and Mary Hirst won the NCAA Division II women's tennis doubles national championship in 1993. The NCAA held individual national titles in men's and women's tennis through the 1994 season; Armstrong State's Pradeep Raman (1991) and Philipp Schertel (1992) had won men's singles titles previously. The FMU duo defeated Rebecca Huereque and Tracy Nguyen of Cal Poly Pomona 3-6, 6-2, 6-3 in the final.
The duo entered the flight unseeded, winning four matches in three days. Whitwell, a freshman, was the 1993 PBAC Player of the Year while Hirst was in her sophomore seaosn and named an NAIA All-American in 1992. Ironically, the duo did not win the PBAC championship that year, falling to Georgia College's Ina Rudzinske and Michelle Palethorpe 3-6, 7-5, 7-6 (10-8) in the final.
Whitwell and Hirst would return and capture the same doubles national title in 1994.
Baseball Receives first NCAA Automatic Bid, Goes to World Series
The 1993 PBAC baseball tournament championship was the first in conference history to award an NCAA DIvision II Tournament automatic bid. Announced in September of 1992, the bid was a huge milestone for the brand-new conference, solidifying its place in the Division II national landscape.
While commonplace now, automatic bids were still in development in the early 90s. NCAA Tournament fields were much smaller than they are 30 years later and it was much more difficult to reach that threshold. USC Aiken and Armstrong State had both advanced to the 1992 NCAA South Atlantic Regional while Columbus State had reached the South Central Regional; all three were ranked in the top 25 that year.
USC Aiken received the first PBC automatic bid, defeating Francis Marion 11-7 in the 1993 PBC championship game. They went on to win the South Atlantic Regional, again beating Francis Marion, to become the first PBC baseball team to reach the Division II World Series. The Pacers won their first game 13-12 against Adelphi before dropping the next two, but not before cementing their place in conference history.
1992-93 Commissioner's Cup Champion
USC Upstate
PBC Hall of Famers first year of PBC activity: 1992-93
Brett Simpson, Lander
Other 1992-93 Notables
The PBAC issued its first Presidential Honor Roll in 1993, recognizing every student-athlete with a 3.0 GPA or higher.
1993-94
A National Power Rises
 |
|
| The 1994 Columbus State men's golf team |
|
The 1993-94 season was dominated by the Peach Belt Athletic Conference on the national stage. The league reached heights its founders might not have thought possible with three team national championships and more individual titles.
- The Columbus State men's golf team won their second national title in three years. The Cougars captured the 1994 crown by storming back from a 23-stroke deficit to beat North Florida in the final round with 1,175 strokes to UNF's 1,179. CSU juniors Mark Immelman and Martin Lonardi were named All-Americans along with USC Aiken's Brian Kassel, Ed Reevey and Jamie Stanley; Stanley also won the Phil Mickelson Award that year. USC Aiken finished fifth in the 94 national championship.
- Lander won it's second straight men's tennis national title, again defeating Hamption in the final. The score of that match was 5-3, the closest result of any of the 8 titles Lander would go on to win.
- Kennesaw State won the 1994 NAIA baseball national championship. The Owls were in the process of completing the transition to NCAA Division II and would join the Peach Belt the following season.
- Lander's Brett Simpson and Lee Holyoak won the NCAA Men's Tennis Doubles National Championship. It was a given that Lander would take the title in that spot as Simpson and Holyoak defeated their own teammates, Alex Lindholm and Rodrigo Urzua, in the final 7-5, 6-2.
- Francis Marion's Lee Whitwell and Mary Hirst won their second straight women's tennis doubles national title, beating Ana Golubovic and Denis Valentin of Grand Canyon 6-1, 7-5. They became only the third doubles team in NCAA history to win back-to-back individual titles. 1994 was the final year the NCAA held individual national championships.
Basketball Receives Automatic Bids as NCAA Reforms DII Tournament
The 1993-94 men's and women's basketball season saw a number of changes that had a profound impact on the Peach Belt. The league received automatic bids for the first time that season as the NCAA re-aligned its national tournament regions and expanded the field size.
PBAC men's basketball would compete in the new South Region which included the Sunshine State Conference and Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference along with independents Erskine, Limestone, Newberry and Wofford. Six teams would advance to the regional with three automatic bids and three at-large.
Women's basketball, which had been previously split between two regions, would unite in the new South Atlantic region. The PBAC would be paired with the South Atlantic Conference and the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association (CIAA) with the same four independents.
Lander won the first men's basketball NCAA automatic bid, beating Columbus State 76-74 in the PBAC championship game. USC Upstate won the first women's basketball automatic bid, beating Columbus State 61-60 in the conference tournament final.
1993-94 Commissioner's Cup Champion
USC Upstate
PBC Hall of Famers first year of PBC activity: 1993-94
Stan Aldridge, Georgia College
Stilian Shishkov, Lander
Claes Persson, Lander
Other 1993-94 Notables
The Armstrong State....Stingrays? Don't laugh, it
almost happened.
1994-95
The Owl Has Landed
Kennesaw State University completed its transition to full NCAA Division II membership and was a full member of the Peach Belt starting with the 1994-95 season. To celebrate, KSU won four PBAC Championships and two PBAC Tournament titles along with a national championship.
It started early as the Owls took the men's and women's cross country titles in the fall of 1994, the first two PBAC championships of the year. The men's team took the top five spots in the race and put seven runners in the top 10 as they won with a PBC-record 15 points. It would be the first of six straight conference titles for the Owls, who went on to finish 14th in the NCAA National Championship that year, becoming the first conference team to run in that event. The women's team scored 44 in holding off Armstrong State to win the PBAC crown, the first of seven straight titles.
 |
|
| Kennesaw State celebrates winning the 1995 National Championship |
|
The KSU softball team finished 53-5 in their first season at Division II, going unbeaten in PBC regular-season play and winning a rain-shortened PBAC Tournament without dropping a game. KSU then swept the NCAA South Regional tournament and became the first conference team to reach the World Series. There, they were upset by Wisconsin-Parkside 4-3 in 8 innings to open the tournament and had to come through the loser's bracket, winning five straight to give the conference its first softball championship. KSU beat Bloomsburg 3-2 in eight innings in the national championship game. Four All-Americans were named from that KSU team and coach Scott Whitlock was named the National Coach of the Year.
The Owls baseball team went 19-4 in conference play in 1995 and swept every game in the PBAC Tournament to take the title. Things came to an abrupt end in the NCAA South Atlantic Regional with losses to Georgia College and Wingate, but the table had been set.
Lander, Armstrong State Win Tennis National Titles
Lander ran their streak to three in a row while Armstrong State captured their first NCAA Division II women's tennis national title in 1995.
Lander, ranked #1 all season long, won their third title by beating North Florida 4-2 in the championship match in California. Lander went 19-0 on the season. The season was a bit of a surprise as Lander had graduated several seniors the year before. But led by future PBC Hall of Famer Claes Persson, Lander also won their third straight conference title.
The Armstrong State women's tennis team defeated Grand Canyon 4-0 to give the PBAC its first women's national champion. The Pirates captured the doubles point (all three doubles matches provided 1 point to the winning team) and then won three singles matches to take the crown. PBC legend Sandra van der Aa captured the championship point at #1 singles 6-4, 6-1. Van der Aa was named the 1995 PBAC Player of the Year as a freshman, the first of her three Player of the Year awards.
USC Aiken Becomes first Conference School to Host National Championship
USC Aiken became the first PBAC school to host an NCAA Division II national championship event in 1995 with men's golf at Cedar Creek Golf Club. The Pacers, who finished second in that event, started a trend of conference schools hosting finals in the 90s:
- USC Aiken, 1995 men's golf
- USC Upstate, 1995 cross country
- USC Upstate, 1995 soccer
- USC Upstate, 1998 soccer
1994-95 Commissioner's Cup Champion
USC Upstate
PBC Hall of Famers first year of PBC activity: 1994-95
Mike Sansing, Kennesaw State
Scott Whitlock, Kennesaw State
Other 1994-95 Notables
- Lander's Claes Persson won the men's Division II National Championship at the Rolex National Small College Championships
- Armstrong State's Sandra van der Aa won the women's Division II National Championship at the Rolex National Small College Championships
1995-96
The Kings of Spring
The spring of 1996 was one of unprecedented success in the Peach Belt with four national championships. Kennesaw State won both the baseball and softball titles while Lander continued their roll in men's tennis and Armstrong State won their second straight in women's tennis.
- Kennesaw State became only the second NCAA Division II school to win both the baseball and softball national championship in the same season (Cal State Northridge, 1994)
- The Owls baseball team was second to Columbus State in the regular-season conference standings and lost to the Cougars in the PBAC Tournament championship game. However, the Owls beat CSU in two of three games at the South Atlantic Regional to advance to the World Series. There, they won four straight games including a 4-0 shutout of St. Joseph's in the national championship game. It was the first baseball title for the Peach Belt.
- The KSU softball team became one of four programs in NCAA history (through 2020) to win back-to-back national titles. The Owls won the PBAC regular-season and tournament titls and swept all four games in the South Regional to advance to the finals in Emporia, Kansas. There, they won their first three games before a setback against UC Davis. The Owls had already clinched a spot in the final and rebounded with a 6-4 win over Nebraska-Omaha in the championship game. Cara Dornstruder drove in four of the Owls' six runs in that game, including a three-run home run.
- Lander picked up national championship #4, blasting Rollins 4-1 in the national championship match. Lander never lost more than one point in any of the four matches at the final.
- Armstrong State put the cap on a 21-2 season with their second straight title, beating Abilene Christian 4-0 in the national championship match. The Pirates shut out all four of their opponents at the final. Georgia College won the third-place match at the finals.
 |
|
| The 1996 Kennesaw State baseball team |
|
Finis Horne Announces Retirement
Lander's Finis Horne announced on May 26, 1996, that the 96-97 season would be his last. The founder of the Lander athletics program in 1968 as the men's basketball coach, he became the school's first athletic director in 1971 and won 436 games over his 28-year career. He was a pivotal figure in the creation of the Peach Belt, credited with coming up with the name 'Peach Belt' for the new Division II conference, and was enshrined in the PBC's first Hall of Fame class as a Founding Father. He led Lander to their first NCAA Tournament appearance in 1994 and won the 1994 and 1995 PBAC Tournaments and was named the Coach of the Year. To this day, Lander men's and women's basketball and wrestling compete in the Finis Horne Arena on campus and he was named 'Athletic Director Emeritus' upon his retirement in 1997.
Clayton State Joins Peach Belt
The Peach Belt announced that Clayton State College would become the league's 11th member. The Lakers joined the Peach Belt on July 1, 1995, as they began the transition from the NAIA to NCAA Division II, which they would complete for the 1997-98 season. Clayton State started men's and women's cross country, women's soccer, women's tennis and men's golf for the 1995-96 season and played full PBAC schedules and competed in tournaments that did not have NCAA automatic bids.
PBAC Basketball Tournament Begins its New Arena Tour
The first four PBAC Tournaments were held at the George A. Christenberry Fieldhouse in Augusta, which was among the newest and largest facilities in the conference. That changed in the intervening years as the tournament became a reward for those who built new facilities.
- Georgia College's Centennial Center was completed in 1990 and hosted the tournament in 1996 and 1997
- Armstrong State's Sports Center opened in 1995 and hosted the 1998 and 1999 events
- Lander's Finis Horne Arena opened in 1996 and hosted the tournament in 2000 and 2001
- Columbus State's Frank G. Lumpkin Center opened in 2001 and hosted the 2002 and 2003 tournament
- The USC Aiken Convocation Center opened in 2007 and welcomed the PBC Tournament from 2008-2011
1994-95 Commissioner's Cup Champion
Kennesaw State
PBC Hall of Famers first year of PBC activity: 1995-96
Brantley Mack, Lander
Jason Jones, Kennesaw State
Other 1995-96 Notables
- 1996 was a strange time for school name changes, thanks to the University System of Georgia declaring that all state instutions must be have 'university' in their names, graduate degrees or not. That led to some of the following tongue-twisters: Armstrong Atlantic State University, Georgia College and State University, Clayton College and State University and (deep breath) North Georgia College and State University. Fortunately, none of those names survive today but they did make for a fun 10 years of acronyms. Other schools such as Augusta State, Kennesaw State and Columbus State dropped the 'College' in exchange for 'University' while in North Carolina, Pembroke State became UNC Pembroke
This concludes the first edition of the PBC Chronicle. The next edition will look at the years 1996-97 through 2000-01. This chronicle is not intended to be comprehensive, there are many, many notable events that there is simply not room to include, so please forgive us if we left out something that was important to you.
The stories curated here were done so with the assistance of a group of former and current PBC Sports Information Directors and the conference cannot thank them enough for their help: Lindy Brown (USCA), Chad Jackson (Armstrong), Michael Hawkins (FMU), Torye Hurst (PBC), Michael MacEachern (USCS), Frank Mercogliano (Augusta), and Bob Stoner (Lander).