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| Ashton Gronewold |
Ashton Gronewold and Joe Winters, who established a number of records during the course of the recently completed football season at UMR, head the group of Miner players who have been selected to the Great Lakes Football Conference all-league team for the 2006 campaign.
Gronewold shared the league's "Offensive Player of the Year" award with Central State running back Derrick Moss after breaking 12 school records over the course of the fall. Among the records he established were his receiving marks of 78 catches for 1,120 yards and for all-purpose yards with 1,788.
He also broke the UMR career marks in receiving and scoring during the season and set new single-game records for receiving yards (229 vs. Morehead State) and all-purpose yards (294 vs. Saint Joseph's). In all, Gronewold scored 17 touchdowns for the season, 15 receiving, one on a kickoff return and another on a punt return.
Winters, meanwhile, broke the Miner single-season marks for passing yards with 3,724 and total offense with 3,731, a mark that leads NCAA Division II. In his first season at UMR, the graduate student headed up the Miner passing game that also ranks first in the nation at the end of regular season play and was named as the "Offensive Player of the Year" for the Division II independents by D2Football.com.
Gronewold and Winters were among five Miner players named to the first team, while another five were selected to the second team.
Joining that duo on the first team were senior wide receiver Brandon Landry, who caught 52 passes for 742 yards and 11 touchdowns; placekicker Tim Valencia, who went 42-of-44 on extra point attempts and made eight of his 11 field goal tries; and punter Brian Mueller, who led the GLFC with an average of 37.6 yards per punt with 10 punts downed inside the opponents' 20-yard line and no touchbacks.
The five second team selections were running back Matt Padilla (team-high 585 yards rushing and 1,120 all-purpose yards), offensive tackle Ken Pearce, linebacker Avian Jordan (team-high 113 tackles), defensive tackle Derek Drussa (26 tackles and four sacks) and safety Brian Jordan (61 tackles, three interceptions).
On the D2Football.com All-Independent team, Winters, Gronewold, Pearce, Jordan and Valencia were first-team selections, while Landry and Gronewold (as a kick returner) were second-team picks. Padilla, Mueller, Brian Jordan and defensive end Loren Severs (28 tackles, 6.5 tackles for a loss) were honorable mention picks.
UMR finished the 2006 season with a record of 6-5.
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