CANISIUS COLLEGE ATHLETICS
The Canisius athletic department announced Tuesday that Whitney (Card) Buchli ’08 – women’s lacrosse, Matt Mazurek ’07, MS ’12 – baseball, Katie (Miranto) Burd ’08, MS ’10 – softball, Jess (Stackhouse) Bramer ’08 – volleyball, Dana “Binky” Johnson ’94 – men’s basketball and Pete Koehneke – athletic trainer have been selected as the 56th induction class to the Canisius College Sports Hall of Fame. Additionally, Joe Van Volkenburg ’88, the former senior associate director of Canisius Campus Ministry, will be presented with the Rev. Paul J. Dugan, S.J., Award, an honor that recognizes individuals for their significant contributions to Canisius athletics.
The Canisius Sports Hall of Fame induction ceremony will be held Saturday, Jan. 26, 2019, when the hockey team plays host to Bentley at KeyBank Rink at Harborcenter. Game time is set for 4:05 p.m. The annual Hall of Fame Day will begin with a special “Induction Luncheon” from 1:30-4 p.m., in the Canal View Room at Pearl Street Grill and Brewery, located at 76 Pearl Street in Buffalo. The cost is $35 per person ($15 for children ages 10 and younger) and includes a buffet lunch, beverages, a dessert bar, a cash bar and a ticket to the hockey game. Those interested in taking part in the “Induction Luncheon” are asked to R.S.V.P. to the Canisius Office of Alumni Engagement by calling (716) 888-2700 or register online by CLICKING HERE. The deadline to R.S.V.P. is Jan. 18, 2019.
To be eligible for the Canisius College Sports Hall of Fame, a former student-athlete must have completed his/her eligibility at least 10 years prior to induction, be a graduate of the College, been acclaimed as an undergraduate as one of the outstanding athletes in the history of the school and, since graduation, the student-athletes’ life must have continued to reflect favorably on the College. Non-athletes may be inducted if they have made outstanding contributions to Canisius College athletics.
The Canisius Sports Hall of Fame, which began in 1963, now boasts 201 individual members with the addition of this year’s group.
Whitney (Card) Buchli ’08 – A four-time letterwinner and the 2006 Canisius Female Athlete of the Year, Whitney (Card) Buchli is the second former women’s lacrosse player to be inducted into Canisius’ Sports Hall of Fame. In her four-year career that spanned from 2005-08, Buchli played in 63 games, where she scored 137 goals to go with 27 assists for 163 points. In her first season as a Griff in 2005, she set the school record for goals in a season by a freshman with 41, and followed that effort with 53 goals and 12 assists for 65 points in 2006 en route to being honored as the MAAC’s Offensive Player of the Year and an All-MAAC First-Team honoree. The Alton, Ontario native capped her sophomore campaign as a MAAC All-Tournament selection after the Blue and Gold advanced to the program’s first MAAC Championship game. She scored 25 goals and added five assists in 2008, as Canisius advanced to its second MAAC Women’s Lacrosse Championship tournament in three seasons, and she helped the Class of 2008 graduate from the program as the first group to have a winning record, both overall (35-33) and in league play (16-11).
Matt Mazurek ’07, MS ’12 – A native of Silver Creek, N.Y., Matt Mazurek played in and started 101 career games for the Golden Griffins during the 2005 and 2006 baseball seasons. A career .355 hitter, Mazurek became the first Canisius baseball player in five years to earn All-MAAC First Team honors in 2005 after he hit .351 with 10 doubles, two triples, seven homers, 41 RBI and 24 runs scored to go with 23 walks and seven stolen bases. In his senior campaign, he became the second Canisius baseball player in program history to earn All-MAAC First Team accolades in back-to-back seasons after he hit a team-best .358 and set the school record with 68 hits, including 12 doubles and two home runs. The 2006 Canisius Male Athlete of the Year, he currently ranks eighth in career batting average at Canisius, despite playing in Blue and Gold for just two seasons, and his career .469 on-base percentage is fifth-best in the program’s record book.
After playing three seasons of professional baseball, Mazurek joined the collegiate coaching ranks, and on Sept. 6, 2017, was named the head coach of the Canisius baseball team. In his first season as the program’s head coach, he led the Griffs to 35 wins and the school’s third MAAC Baseball Championship in the last six years. He is the 16th former baseball player and one of two active Canisius head coaches (joining men’s lacrosse coach Mark Miyashita) to be enshrined into the Canisius Sports Hall of Fame.
Katie (Miranto) Burd ’08, MS ’10 – A four-year letterwinner who played in and started 192 career games for the Griffs, Katie (Miranto) Burd will be the 18th former softball player to be inducted into the Canisius Sports Hall of Fame. During her time with the program, the Blue and Gold posted an overall record of 116-77 to go with a 49-14 mark in MAAC play. She was a part of three MAAC Championship teams and played in three NCAA Division I Softball Championships.
The program’s career leader in hits (227), runs scored (161) and total bases (343), she ranks eighth in program history in career batting average at .378, highlighted by her senior year average of .408 in 2008, which ranked 38th in the nation. A three-time All-MAAC First Team honoree (2006, 2007, 2008), the North Tonawanda, N.Y., native was honored as the MAAC Co-Player of the Year in 2008 before being named the 2008 MAAC Softball Championship MVP after the Griffs won the league’s tournament championship. She served as a team captain for the 2008 squad, which set the school record for wins in a season at 39. That group is the last Canisius team to win an NCAA Tournament game – a 3-2 win over LIU-Brooklyn on May 17, 2008.
For as good as she was on the diamond, Burd might have been even better in the classroom. A three-time MAAC All-Academic Team selection and an ESPN the Magazine/CoSIDA Academic All-America selection in 2008, she closed out her collegiate career by becoming just the second Canisius female to be honored as the MAAC Female Student-Athlete of the Year, the highest honor presented to a student-athlete by the conference office.
Jess (Stackhouse) Bramer ’08 – One of two volleyball players in MAAC history to be named the league’s top defensive player three times in a career, Jess (Stackhouse) Bramer is the third former volleyball player to be inducted into the Canisius Sports Hall of Fame. A four-year letterwinner for the Canisius volleyball program from 2004-07, Bramer graduated as the program’s career leader in digs with 2,095 (she currently ranks second in school history). An All-MAAC First Team honoree in 2006, and an All-MAAC Second Team choice in 2007, Bramer recorded 621 digs as the Blue and Gold’s libero in back-to-back seasons, which ranks fourth on the school’s single-season digs list. She still holds the school record for digs in a four-set match with 41, set Sept. 23, 2007 vs. Iona, and she ended her volleyball career as the first player in conference history to record more than 2,000 career digs.
Bramer also earned two letters as a member of the Canisius softball team, where she was a pitcher for the Griffs. In 2005, her first season with the program, Bramer went 5-1 with a 1.45 earned run average and 43 strikeouts in 19 appearances in the circle. The 2007 Canisius Female Athlete of the Year returned to the softball roster in 2008 and appeared in eight games as a reliever, where she struck out four batters in 10.0 innings of work.
Dana “Binky” Johnson ’94 – A four-time letterwinner and a two-time team captain for the men’s basketball program, Johnson is the 54th former member of the men’s basketball team to join the College’s Sports Hall of Fame. In his career which spanned from 1990-94, Johnson played in 99 career games in Blue and Gold and earned 65 starts. He averaged 6.7 points, 2,9 rebounds, 3.2 assists and 1.8 steals per game, highlighted by his senior season where he was good for 12.2 points and 4.4 assists per contest. He graduated from Canisius as just the sixth player in school history to dish out more than 300 assists in his career, and his 183 career steals ranks fifth-best in program history. In 1992-93, he recorded 79 steals, which is still the program’s single-season steals record, and his 1.8 steals per game average ranks third-best in school history to this day.
Johnson’s running one-hander with one second left on the clock in the 1993 MAAC Tournament quarterfinal win over Iona helped push Canisius to the program’s first MAAC Tournament semifinal round appearance, and his 12.2 points per game in 1993-94 helped the Blue and Gold to the program’s first MAAC regular-season championship after the team went 12-2 in conference play. That season, where Canisius posted 22 wins, including a school-record 21 wins in the regular season, propelled the Griffs to a berth in the 1994 NIT. Johnson ended his career on Main Street by scoring 15 points in the team’s NIT loss at Villanova. That game against the Wildcats was played just nine miles from Johnson’s hometown of Norristown, Pa.
Pete Koehneke – Former head athletic trainer Pete Koehneke served the Canisius athletic department and its student-athletes for 39 years before officially retiring in the spring of 2017. A native of Indiana, Koehneke joined the Canisius staff in 1978 after serving as the head athletic trainer for two years at Rhode Island College. A 1974 graduate of Indiana State University, Koehneke was as an assistant athletic trainer at his alma mater prior to taking over the athletic training efforts at Rhode Island College.
Inducted into the National Athletic Trainers’ Hall of Fame in 2002, Koehneke helped create and supervise Canisius’ sports medicine program that trained and prepared countless students to join the athletic training field. In addition to serving as the head athletic trainer for Canisius’ men’s basketball, softball and golf programs, among others, he was the chair of the Canisius Sports Medicine, Health & Human Performance Department from 1995-2008, and then was the elected chair of the College’s Kinesiology Department from 2014-17.
In 2016, Koehneke’s contributions to the field of athletic training was formally recognized by the Commission on Accreditation of Athletic Trainer Education (CAATE), as the organization named its “lifetime achievement award” the Pete Koehneke Award. He is the second Canisius athletic trainer to be inducted into the Sports Hall of Fame, joining James Hutch, who was a member of the 1981 induction class.
Joe Van Volkenburg ’88 – The College’s former Senior Associate Director of Campus Ministry, Joe Van Volkenburg was a member of the Canisius community for 24 years where he worked tirelessly to involve Canisius students, faculty and staff in local community outreach efforts within Buffalo’s homeless and less fortunate populations. A 1988 graduate of the College, Van Volkenburg helped spearhead programs such as the Burrito Project, the Sandwich and Spirituality Ministry, Meals on Wheels and Habitat for Humanity, and served as the key contact for Canisius’ student-athletes in their volunteering efforts.
In addition to his work around campus and in the community, Van Volkenburg, a familiar face in the crowd at countless home and road sporting events, is the sixth recipient of the Rev. Paul J. Dugan, S.J., Award, presented annually to individuals whose acts or efforts have significantly benefited Canisius athletics.
