Marcel Lomnicky Brings a National Title to Virginia Tech

21 year old Virginia Tech freshman Marcel Lomnicky won the National
Championship in the hammer throw on Saturday at the NCAA Outdoor Track and
Field Championships at the University of Arkansas. He is Tech’s first National
Champion since Spyridon Jullien won four national championships, taking both the
weight throw and hammer throw in 2005 and 2006.

Lomnicky is a native of Slovakia, and his career best throw of 235 feet, 6
inches was enough to win the Gold Medal by over three feet over runner-up Walter
Henning of LSU.

Lomnicky’s National Championship was the highlight of a very successful
weekend for Tech’s track & field programs. The women’s team finished 12th
nationally with 18 points, the highest finish in team history. The men’s team
finished 16th with 14.5 points. Seven Tech athletes earned All-American honors.

Texas A&M was dominant at the event, winning the men’s and women’s
National Championship. The Aggie women scored 50 points, and the men finished
with 48.

Virginia Tech promoted assistant coach Mike Brizendine to head coach last
week, following the departure of previous head coach Oliver Weiss. Brizendine
has been the top assistant for the Hokies over the last five seasons.

Brizendine played at James Madison from 1995-98, and later played
professionally for the Roanoke Wrath and the Northern Virginia Royals. He also
has head coaching experience at Bridgewater College.

Brizendine was the head coach at Bridgewater from 2001 through 2003. His 2002
and 2003 teams combined to go 23-13, and he was named the Old Dominion Athletic
Conference Coach of the Year in 2003.

Following Virginia Tech’s run to the College Cup (the soccer equivalent of
the Final Four) in 2007, Brizendine was named Atlantic Region Assistant Coach of
the Year by the NSCAA.

Virginia Tech also announced the hiring of assistant basketball coach Bill
Courtney. Courtney replaces former assistant Stacey Palmore, who accepted a
position as an assistant coach at the University of Georgia.

Courtney has a lot of coaching experience in the mid-Atlantic region. He
played in college at Bucknell, and following a short professional career
overseas, he began his college coaching career. He began coaching in 1995 at
American, and went to Bowling Green one year later to coach under Jim Larranaga.
He then moved to George Mason with Larranaga, where he was associate head coach
for eight seasons.

Courtney has also coached at Providence, and he spent three seasons on the
staff at Virginia. He accepted a position at Virginia Commonwealth in April, but
he left that job after just two months to move back to the ACC.