The 81 student-athletes at Eastern Wyoming College represent five continents, with players coming from all four hemispheres of the globe to don a Lancer uniform.
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TORRINGTON – The 81 student-athletes at Eastern Wyoming College represent five continents, with players coming from all four hemispheres of the globe to don a Lancer uniform.
Twenty-seven of the 81 student-athletes at EWC come from Wyoming, including 10 from Goshen County, but there are also 16 that come from outside of the United States. The average player travels 1,125 miles from their hometown to Torrington to compete for the Lancers.
The women’s basketball team brings in players from the farthest places, on average. Nicole Cutler, who is from Palmerston North, New Zealand, is the farthest Lancer from home, with 7,577 miles separating Palmerston North and Torrington. Ijeoma Adaora Ezikeolisa is the second farthest from her hometown, which is Lagos, Nigeria, separated by 6,796 miles.
Ines Salat Margarit (Barcelona, Spain), Abril Rexach Roure (Lleida, Spain) and Pamela Bethel (Nassau, Bahamas) round out the international players for the women’s basketball team. Lauren O’Connell is from Houston, Texas, which is 1,188 miles from Torrington.
After the top six players on the roster, based on distance from home, the remaining six athletes are from within 300 miles away. Kaylynn Jefferson (Lingle), Emily Buchanan (Yoder), Macie Mackey (Gillette) and Morning Gambler (Fort Washakie) are all from Wyoming, with Cathlyn Knutson coming from Red Shirt, S.D. and Kelliann Raff from Denver, Colo.
On average, the Lady Lancers basketball players travel 2,373 miles to get to EWC.
Second in average miles away from Torrington is the Lancer men’s basketball team, averaging 1,715 miles from home. Bruno Oliveira leads the pack, with Sao Paulo, Brazil sitting 5,828 miles from the Lancers’ home floor. Alek Cosic and Janko Stojanovic surpassed the 5,000-mile mark on their way to Torrington, both coming from Serbia. Brandon Meadows and Daniel Wright, who are both from Freeport, Bahamas, and Jonathan Morrobel from Santiago, Dominican Republic, round out the international players for the Lancers.
Chad Hinrichs had a long way to go, despite staying in the country, as he comes from Panama City, Fla. Jordan Mirich had the shortest trip among his teammates, coming from Lingle. Ty Larson and Mark Vandeventer are not far behind, hailing from Douglas. Trey Schroefel (Buffalo) and Kolton Wall (Rawlins) both come from Wyoming, while Walker Korell (Frederick, Colo.), Nick Holmes (Denver, Colo.) and Rhythm Ajanku (Longmont, Colo.) round out the roster.
The EWC golf team has three international players, all from Europe. Gonzalo Arcelay Fernandez-Meras (Manguia, Spain), George Elliot (Salisbury, England) and Cameron Heath (Bolton, England) skew the team’s average miles traveled to EWC, which is 1,588 miles, because they are all more than 4,000 miles from their hometown.
Including local talents Kash Kaufman (Torrington) and Jared Pilkington (Scottsbluff, Neb.), two additional golfers come from Wyoming in Trey Massey and Hunter Robbins, while the remainder of the roster, Dalton Bingham, Canyon Hatfield and Malosi Togisala, all hail from Utah.
With only two international players, the EWC volleyball team has the second-lowest average distance from home at 947 miles. Helena Khouri and Giovanna Jordao bring the average up, with both coming from their hometowns in Brazil, which is more than 5,000 miles from Torrington.
Other than the two international players, the rest of the Lady Lancers come from Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming. Lissette Lefforge is the only representative from Colorado, while Jaslyn Seely, from Sundance, and Kodi Edwards, Jaysie Thomas, Katie Strohschein and Kylee Tresch, all from Wright, are the Wyoming players. Paige Vitosh, Sage Martin, Alex Simmerman, Shaniah Freeseman, Tanna Badje, Dawson Sharman and Precious Williams all come from Nebraska. The volleyball team is the only squad without a Goshen County player.
With no international athletes, the EWC rodeo team averages the shortest distance from home at 237 miles. Gannan Johnson (Lisban, N.D.) and Bailey Wickre (Gary, S.D.) lead the pack in miles covered to get to Torrington. Also over the 500-mile mark is Sutton Adams from Dell Rapids, S.D.
With five competitors from Torrington (Canton Afdahl, Cole Brunkhardt, Chance Lane and Logan Milligan) and one from Yoder (Jacey Thomas), the Lancer rodeo team carries the bulk of locally grown talent. They also have four other athletes from Wyoming, along with three from Nebraska and four from Colorado. Seven total rodeoers come from South Dakota with the remaining three talents coming from North Dakota.
Looking across sports, the freshman have out-traveled the sophomores, with the 43 first-years averaging 1,262 miles traveled, while the second-year athletes averaged 971 miles traveled.
Torrington is the most well represented hometown among the 81 athletes, with six representatives, followed by Wright, with four. Pueblo, Colo. and Douglas each have three of their athletes now competing in Torrington.
