Kicking off the shortlists with a big one, the Team of the Year Award celebrates the most successful teams of the year gone by in terms of performance and achievement.
With so many team successes in the year just gone, including promotions in BUCS leagues and a glittering set of medals from BUCS events, this is an incredibly competitive category. The five shortlistees demonstrated clear objectives, which they not only met, but blew away completely.
Blues Baseball, CU Baseball Society
The Cambridge University Baseball Society (CUBS) won the Midlands league title for the first time since baseball became a sport within BUCS. For the first time each, they defeated the University of East Anglia (national runners-up this year) and the University of Nottingham (national rank #8 this year) in league play.
Furthermore, the CUBS reached the semifinal game of the national championship tournament and went home with a 4th place finish, their highest ever. Within this tournament consisting of 11 teams and 155 registered players, Marc Theberge, the captain of the CUBS, led all eligible players offensively in batting average, on-base percentage, and slugging percentage, key offensive output metrics. On defence, Marc led all other players in pitching wins, and President JJ Thio led in putouts. Beyond the CUBS, Marc and James Green, an informal leader by example, won the 2024 British National Baseball League championship with the London Mets in September 2024. Marc held the highest on-base percentage of all eligible players in the national baseball league - the highest level of baseball in England. In short, this team has accomplished its 1st league title and highest national finish while its leading players dominate at the highest level of baseball in England.
Competitions Team, CU Mountaineering Club
Cambridge has been the most successful team in the south of England, winning all 4 London University Bouldering Events this season (out of over 20 universities), and winning the overall title.
On top of that, they had 5 final individual finalists in the first round, 3 in the second, 4 in the 3rd, and 4 overall individual finalists, winning 11 individual medals across the league. Cambridge also won the male team, female team and male individual gold in varsity, as well as the overall title, with a silver and bronze medal in the women’s individual.
The men’s team also put out an outstanding performance in BUCS, coming joint 4th and having Matthew Fall qualify for the individual finals. Matthew also represented the team in the national lead finals, and the national speed finals.
Women’s A Team, CU Clay Pigeon Shooting Club
Starting the year strong, the Women’s A Team took BUCS by storm, claiming Gold for the 2nd consecutive year, with a nice margin of 264/400 compared to the next highest women’s teams on 193/400 and 177/400. Individual performances were also solid with Liz claiming Silver, Georgina 4th and Emily 5th, comfortably placing them in the top 10%.
This winning streak then continued at Varsity, where the Women’s A Team claimed victory for the 4th year running, again with a nice margin (291/400 vs 227/400). Women’s High Gun went to Georgina for the 4th consecutive year (the most high guns wins in the history of the club), narrowly beating Liz on a countback system after shooting the same score.
Notably Georgina and Liz have also been securing silverware in non-University competitions, with Liz being the current Cambridgeshire Ladies Champion in ESP shooting, and Georgina taking Silver in Ladies at the British Open, along with numerous County Ladies Champion titles in various disciplines, regional medals, and currently being shortlisted for England Team selection.
Overall, this is a severely powerful team who have worked hard in recent years to build an incredible reputation and be a dominant force in all University level competition.
Women’s Blues, CU Lawn Tennis Club
The CULTC Women's Blues have had an extraordinary year, winning our BUCS league for the 2nd consecutive year, becoming the 2024 National Trophy Championships, representing Cambridge University at the All England Lawn Tennis Club, and beating Oxford twice this season. Our players are now competing against semi-professional players and girls who have played D1 in the US, proving that we can pursue academics and sports to the same level as the best tennis universities in the country!
The team has topped BUCS league for 2 consecutive years (this year being South Premier champions!), beaten Oxford twice already this season. Individual athletes reached the Main Draw of BUCS singles and making quarter finals of national BUCS doubles, represented Cambridge at AELTC and qualified for BUCS national league playoff.
Women’s Cross Country A Team, CU Hare & Hounds
The Women’s A team won gold at the BUCS XC championships in February, an historic win and the first non-Loughborough or Birmingham win for 25 years. A true testament to the club’s meteoric ascent in recent years.
To break the cycle of Birmingham and Loughborough who have professional coaching set ups and actively recruit runners is a phenomenal achievement.
Cambridge Team consisted of Niamh Bridson Hubbard, Bea Wood, Poppy Craig-McFeely (Captain), and Milly Dickinson. To achieve the Team gold Cambridge athletes placed 4th, 5th and 8th out of 164 athletes. This was however a truly team performance, normally only the top 3 athletes count but it ended up being a tie and therefore the performance of the 4th athlete coming in 12th place won it for them. The very definition of a team performance!
2 members of this team Poppy and Milly also received their first ever GB vest (Niamh and Bea have already achieved this) when they were asked to represent England at the European U23 Cross Country Championships and the team came away with a Gold medal as well.
