NWC to honor former athletes

The Northwestern College Red Raider Club will induct three alumni into its Athletic Hall of Fame and recognize its 2009 coach of the year and Barnabas Award recipients on Saturday, Feb. 20. They will be honored at the Athletic Recognition Luncheon at 12 noon in the Vermeer Dining Room and at halftime of the men’s basketball game against the University of Sioux Falls, which starts at 4 p.m.

Renae Bahrke and Nick Scholten of Orange City, along with Jaime Woudstra of Denver, will bring the number of Hall of Famers to 92. Bryan Case of Lake City, Iowa, will receive Red Raider Club Coach of the Year honors. Pete Stevenson of Lynden, Wash., will receive the Barnabas Award.

Bahrke, a 2002 Northwestern graduate, earned NAIA All-American honorable mention honors in softball as a senior. A four-year letter winner, the shortstop also was conference and region player of the year in 2002 and an NAIA Scholar-Athlete in 2001 and ’02.

Northwestern’s leader in career triples with 20, Bahrke ranks second in career batting average, .394; RBIs, 176; hits, 239; home runs, 30; and runs, 176. She is third in all-time assists with 370. Bahrke also played basketball for two years.

A 1998 graduate of Kingsley-Pierson High School, Bahrke now works as an accountant for Orange City Veterinary Clinic.

Scholten, a 2003 alumnus, was a left tackle who garnered first team NAIA All-American honors for Northwestern’s football teams in 2001 and ’02. He was an honorable mention All-American in 2000, and he received NAIA Scholar-Athlete recognition in his junior and senior seasons.

Scholten graduated from Lynden (Wash.) Christian High School in 1999. He is now an agent for New York Life in Orange City. He served as an assistant coach for the Red Raiders from 2005-08 and worked as assistant director of enrollment services for Northwestern.

Woudstra, a 2004 Northwestern graduate, was a first team NAIA All-American in basketball in 2002, ’03 and ’04. Named to the exclusive Kodak All-American team as a senior, she was also selected as the national winner of the 2003 Emil Liston Award for her excellence in scholarship, character and playing ability. The school’s second leading rebounder with 1,080, Woudstra is also second in blocked shots with 242. She ranks third in scoring with 2,279 points and seventh in assists with 394.

A 2000 graduate of Orange City’s Unity Christian High School, Woudstra assisted her father, Earl, on the coaching staff for Northwestern’s women’s basketball team from 2005-08 and also served as a financial services counselor. She moved to Denver in 2008 and now works as a banking officer at FirstBank of Cherry Creek.

Bryan Case, a 1995 alumnus who earned all-district honors in both baseball and football for the Raiders, will be recognized as the 2009 Red Raider Club Coach of the Year. He led the football team at Southern Cal High School in Lake City to the Class A state title in both 2009 and ’08. Case received the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame Class A Coach of the Year Award and state Class A Coach of the Year Award in 2008.

Under Case’s tutelage for the last nine years, Southern Cal’s teams have compiled a 76-21 record. He also teaches 7-12 physical education and health at Southern Cal and serves as the head high school boys’ track coach. Case is a 1989 graduate of Marcus-Meriden-Cleghorn High School.

Pete Stevenson, a deputy sheriff for Washington’s Whatcom County, will receive the Barnabas Award, which is bestowed upon former Raiders who encouraged others to strive for their best performance athletically, academically and personally, and who used their sport as a way to bring others to a knowledge of Jesus Christ.

A 1979 Northwestern alumnus, Stevenson was a middle distance runner for the Raider track and field team. He was also on the cross country squads that won the Tri-State Conference in 1976 and ’77. He graduated from Meriden-Cleghorn (Iowa) High School in 1975.

Brandon Woudstra will also be recognized at the Feb. 20 luncheon. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame last year but wasn’t able to attend the event because he was playing professional basketball in Germany. Northwestern’s all-time leader in scoring and assists now lives near Orange City and is a basketball skill instructor with CNOS in Dakota Dunes, S.D.

The public is invited to attend the Athletic Recognition Luncheon. For more information, contact Karen Vander Pol in Northwestern’s athletic department, 712-707-7280 or karen@nwciowa.edu.