Sports sponsorship: South Dakota State University will add add 9.5 scholarships in women's sports next season as its first step in the move to Division I. There will be an increase of 4.5 scholarships in men's sports. Five new coaching positions also will be created over the next two years, including a head coach and assistant coach for equestrian as the school begins competition in that sport in the fall of 2005. South Dakota State is the 38th NCAA school to offer equestrian.

Milestones: Pennsylvania State University baseball coach Joe Hindelang won his 600th career game April 18 when his Nittany Lions beat Big Ten Conference rival University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. Hindelang also is just two wins shy of reaching 381 wins at Penn State, which would make him the school's all-time winningest baseball coach ... Wichita State University baseball coach Gene Stephenson passed former University of Texas at Austin coach Cliff Gustafson with for second place on the all-time Division I wins list with his 1,428th victory April 17 against Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

Miscellaneous: John Frieser, a tight end at Colgate University, and Matthew Sharpe, a placekicker/punter at Virginia Military Institute, have been chosen as recipients of the annual Division I-AA Athletics Directors Association Scholar-Athlete of the Year Award. Each will receive a $5,000 postgraduate scholarship. Frieser and Sharpe were selected from a group of eight finalists. Football players from all Division I-AA institutions were eligible for the Division I-AA Academic All-Star Team. There were 93 nominees, of which 31 were selected to the All-Star Team. The eight finalists, from which Frieser and Sharpe were chosen, were among the 31 members of the All-Star Team. Nominees were required to have a minimum grade-point average of 3.200 (4.000 scale) in undergraduate study and have been a starter or key player with legitimate athletics credentials. Frieser is a two-time all-Patriot League selection and one of only two Division I-AA football players to receive a National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame postgraduate scholarship. Sharpe was a finalist for both the Rhodes and Marshall scholarships and was named to the CoSIDA Academic All-America second team. He connected on 17 of 24 field goals, setting the school record for field goals in a season ... The National Association of Academic Advisors for Athletics (N4A) has named four recipients of its annual Wilma Rudolph Student-Athlete Achievement
Award, which honors student-athletes who have overcome great personal, academic and/or emotional odds to achieve academic success while participating in intercollegiate athletics. The N4A recognized Marcello Robinson, a men's basketball student-athlete from Bradley University; Boston College swimmer Brian McLaughlin; football student-athlete Eric Henderson from Georgia Institute of Technology; and track and field student-athlete Jillian Green from Tulane University as recipients of the award for 2004. Nominees for the award must have completed three semesters or four quarters at the nominating institution and passed 36 semester or 48 quarter hours. Students must be athletically eligible for the current academic year, must be in good academic standing at the institution and must be a varsity letter-winner.

-- Compiled by Gary T. Brown