Three of Idaho’s best athletes have been awarded with two of the Western Athletic Conference’s most prestigious awards this year. Basketball standout Kyle Barone and track star Hannah Kiser have been awarded with this year’s Joe Kearney Award for top WAC athlete, while pole-vaulter Jeremy Klas has been awarded with the Stan Bates Award for Top Student Athlete.
File photo by Jesse Hart | Argonaut
Kyle Barone dunks over a pair of La. Tech defenders on Feb. 16 in the Cowan Spectrum.
Each year, the Joe Kearney Award is given to the top male and female athletes in the WAC in all sports. This year’s award marks the second year in a row that a Vandal has received this prestigious recognition.
Barone finished his last season as one of the most decorated Vandal Basketball players of all time, according to head coach Don Verlin. Barone was ranked by the NCAA as the 14th most efficient player.
Barone is a first-team All-WAC performer, two-time WAC Player of the Week and North Idaho Athletics Hall of Fame Male Athlete of the Year. He never missed a game as a Vandal, setting a school record of 126 games played and scored a career 1.433 points, the fourth highest in Idaho history.
During the 2012-13 season, Kiser became only the second woman to win the WAC Athlete of the Year in cross country, indoor and outdoor track.
“It is hard to imagine a person who is more dedicated or works harder than Hannah,” Idaho Director of Track and Field Wayne Phipps said, “She was a solid high school runner and has improved every year while handling herself very well, setting higher goals
for herself.”
Idaho’s All-American pole-vaulter Jeremy Klas received the Stan Bates Award for the top student athlete in the WAC. Klas, who started his career as a walk-on his freshman year, has grown to one of the school’s best athletes, setting the Idaho record in both indoor and outdoor pole vault while earning his degree in Computer Science and graduating with a 3.62 GPA.
“Jeremy is an extremely talented individual who has balanced a strenuous academic schedule with the demands of being a Division I athlete at the University of Idaho,” Rob Spear, Idaho’s director of athletics said. “As an athletic director, I appreciate the example Jeremy sets for other student-athletes and the value he brings into the classroom and locker room. He inspires his peers by channeling his dedication, enthusiasm, passion and work ethic into a positive direction.”
Klas helped his team on and off the track.
According to Phipps, even when Klas was injured and not able to compete he stepped up and helped coach his peers after the jumps coach left mid-season.
Since the creation of the Stan Bates Award in 1981, the Vandals have won nine awards more than any other WAC school with six of those awards going to cross country or track and field.
Curtis Ginnetti can be reached at [email protected]