Wildcat Athletics Articles

Last week marked the opening week for Penn College's fall sports teams.

After another successful year of reaching new program highs, the Penn College athletic teams are ready to keep building as the calendar turns to September and the fall sports season gets underway this week.

They didn’t play in the game, but the Penn College women’s softball team made history at the 2026 MLB Little League Classic. The team formed the tarp crew for the game between the Atlanta Braves and Milwaukee Brewers. It’s believed to be one of the few times, if not the first, in Major League Baseball annals for an all-female tarp crew to work a game.

Penn College graduates Taylor (Brooks) Esposito ’19 and Brittan Kittle ’21 have been selected for induction into Penn College’s Athletics Hall of Fame on Sept. 18, in a 6 p.m. ceremony during Wildcat Weekend.

In the college’s 12th season as a member of the United East Conference, and ninth as a full-fledged member of the NCAA, program records were either set or matched by 10 Wildcat teams.

Three teams competing in national events. What could be better? The softball team earned its first NCAA tournament win at regionals, the golf team finished 39th at the NCAA Division III Men's Championship, and Penn College's archers had two in the top 10 at the USA Archery Collegiate Target Nationals.

With a program-record 33-win season already in the books, Penn College’s all-sophomore and freshman softball team has already exceeded expectations. As it heads into NCAA Division III Regional play starting on Thursday, coach Amber Savage’s goal is simple: “Compete with joy, stay true to who we are, and continue playing our brand of softball."

A year ago, Penn College saw its five-year drought of All-American archers end when Casey Keiter became number 44. This season, coach Dustin Bartron expects what had previously become an annual tradition that produced 43 archers earning the coveted status 88 times to continue.

For the second year in a row, the softball team finished second in the United East Conference to Penn State Brandywine, and for the second year in a row, because Brandywine is still in its provisional timeline of transitioning to Division III and is ineligible to advance, the Wildcats will represent the conference in NCAA Regional play.

Among the best of the best. That’s where the United East Conference-championship Penn College men’s golf team will find itself over the next several days as five Wildcats tee it up with 220 others from the nearly 4,800 student-athletes who competed on more than 40 teams at the NCAA Division III level this season.