Hauck, Sudol named 2022-23 Grizzly Cup winners

The 2022-23 Grizzly Cup winners were announced at the annual Scholar-Athlete Banquet on Tuesday. A pair of seniors with distinguished careers on and off the playing field were honored with football's Robby Hauck and track and field's Holly Sudol taking home the prestigious awards.

The Grizzly Cup has honored Montana's top student-athletes for over a century. The award began in 1921 with three-sport star Larry Higbee and split in 2009 to honor the top male and female athletes.

Hauck becomes the sixth football player since the award was reinstated in 2009 to take home the honor and 48^th overall. Sudol is the fifth-ever women's track and field winner, and the third in the last six years.

Gallery: (5-2-2023) 2023 Grizzly Scholar-Athlete Banquet

Holly Sudol has been a standout on Montana's track and field team, competing across a wide range of events in her years as a Grizzly. She has been particularly strong in the 400m and the 400m hurdles, earning All-Big Sky Conference honors twice entering her final outdoor season.

Sudol, from Edmonds, Wash., ran a time of 1:01.67 in the 400m hurdles at her first outdoor Big Sky Championship meet in 2021 to place third and earn her first All-Conference honor. She added another this season at the indoor conference championships, running her career-best 400 time of 54.74 to place third again.

She is also a five-time point scorer at Big Sky Championships, contributing to some successful 4x400-meter relay teams in her years to go along with the success in the 400-meter and 400-meter hurdles.

"The biggest thing that strikes me when we talk about Holly is her dedication to the sport," head track and field coach Doug Fraley said. "I think last year they found her sweet spot moving from being a multi-event athlete over to being a 400-slash-400 hurdler. I'm sure that gave her confidence last season in finding an area that she could really excel at."

This season, Sudol is reaching another level under the direction of Fraley and his staff. She arrived at Montana in 2019 as a jumper and a short sprinter. Her first experience at a Big Sky Championship in 2020 came competing in the indoor pentathlon, where she would finish 15^th.

After COVID-19 derailed nearly a full year of competition, she returned to the outdoor season in 2021 and began to compete more regularly in the 400-meter hurdles. Still, the focus was on the heptathlon, where she finished 10^th in the league during the 2021 outdoor Big Sky Championships.

In 2022, she finally shifted away from the multi-events, competing only in the 400-meter hurdles and the 4x400-meter relay at the Big Sky Championships. After her first year focusing on the two events, Sudol had a career best time of 57.52 seconds in the 400-meter and had never broken 1:01.00 in the 400-meter hurdles.

This indoor season, Sudol began her impressive climb up the performance lists. She consistently improved throughout the year, eventually running a 54.74 second 400-meter to place third at the Big Sky Championships. The time was over 2.5 seconds faster than her career best entering the season.

She has continued to perform well in that area, again running under 55 seconds at the Pacific Coast Invitational in April, but has also improved in the hurdles. The event is only contested during the outdoor season, and Fraley had been excited for months to see her compete in what he views as Sudol's strongest event.

Sudol didn't disappoint. The senior has been the best in the Big Sky in the event this season, twice running sub-60 second times at the Bengal Invitational in Pocatello. Her current PR of 59.22 has her in first place in the league by more than a full second. It is also a top-30 time in the NCAA West Region, putting her in a good position to make the first round of the NCAA Championships this year.

Her charge up the league's performance lists hasn't been by accident. Fraley said that the level of detail that Sudol puts in to being great does not go unnoticed. It has paid off with some fast times.

"The things that I notice about her are her focus, her internal drive. She does a lot of little, extra things," Fraley said. "Whether it's really paying attention to how she fuels her body or doing little warm-up or recovery exercises on her own before and after practice. She's really diligent in her training and in her preparation to compete."

And for all the success that Sudol has achieved on the track, she has also been a fantastic representative for Montana athletics in the classroom and the community. She is a four-time Academic All-Big Sky Conference Selection and has been a member of the UM Advocates for the past three years.

Sudol has also contributed important work to Montana's Athletics Diversity and Inclusion Committee. The group, formed in 2020, works to combat racial injustice, systemic racism and all forms of inequality within the athletic department and the broader community. She is one of 10 student-athletes on the committee.

In the summer of 2022, Sudol traveled to Portugal working with an opportunity that she gained through UM Entertainment Management's student group. When she came back to Missoula in the fall, Sudol worked as a mentor for local high school students through UM's Flagship Program.

She will graduate this spring with a bachelor's degree in Management and Entrepreneurship and has a 3.53 GPA. Sudol also has an added certificate to her degree from the Franke Global Leadership Initiative.

The same characteristics that make her so successful on the track are what have made her a fantastic ambassador for UM outside of the competitive arena.

"The things that impress me have been her attention to detail. That carries into why she's a great student, why she takes on community service responsibilities, because that's who Holly is," Fraley said. "She is a comprehensive person as a student-athlete and really gets the job done at a high level in all of those things."

Her athletic career is not done yet. Sudol will be with the Grizzlies when they compete at the Big Sky Championships May 10-13 in Greeley, Colorado. There, she will have the chance to become a three or four-time All-Big Sky performer. A Big Sky Championship and qualifications to the NCAA Regional Meet are well within the realm of possibility.

Her performances have spoken for themselves this year, and Fraley said they have also lifted up the teammates that surround her. Sudol's drive and determination make her more than worthy of the Grizzly Cup.

"She competes with a fierce passion to succeed. In competitions, in academics, in internships or community service. She's locked in," Fraley said. "She doesn't do anything halfway. She is the complete package as a student-athlete."

Robby Hauck made headlines in the fall when he broke both the UM and Big Sky Conference tackle records and finished his Grizzly career as one of the best in FCS football history with 482 stops to his name.

Equally as important and impressive, but perhaps not as visible in the headlines, was Hauck's work in the classroom, where he also finished as one of the most accomplished Grizzlies in program history.

Combine the two, and it's a career worthy of one of the most distinguished awards a Montana student-athlete can earn. An award that exemplifies what being a Grizzly is all about, with peak performance on the field and in the classroom.

A career worthy of the Grizzly Cup.

In his four years playing football at Montana, Hauck not only played in but started every game he suited up for. In that time, he averaged over 120 tackles per season and more than nine per game to break the Big Sky record at 482, which places him sixth all-time in the FCS record books.

His prolific tackling and football prowess kept the awards coming during that time as well. A two-time team captain, Hauck was named to seven different All-America teams and was a two-time first-team All-Big Sky selection during his tenure.

He started his career as a finalist for the Jerry Rice Award given to the nation's top freshman and capped it as a finalist for the Buck Buchanan Award that goes to the top overall defender in the FCS.

In the classroom, he was just as prolific, graduating with not one or two but three degrees, all while maintaining a near-perfect GPA. After the fall semester, he departed UM with undergraduate degrees in management information systems and business administration and added a master's in business administration with a cumulative GPA of 3.95. Impressive stuff.

For his efforts, he became one of just six three-time Academic All-Americans in Montana history and was a four-time Academic All-Big Sky selection as well.

He was a finalist for the Stats Perform Doris Robinson Award, given to the top academic standout in the FCS. He was also a semifinalist for the "Academic Heisman" – the National Football Foundation's William V. Campbell Trophy – given to the highest academic and athletic achiever in all of college football.

Hauck has now capitalized on all that collected experience and begun his career in the family business: football coaching. As the son of Montana head coach Bobby Hauck and the nephew of Grizzly Sports Hall Famer and long-time NFL player and coach Tim Hauck, Robby's coaching career is officially off the ground. Earlier in the spring, he returned to California to become the new recruiting coordinator at San Diego State, where his dad spent three seasons coaching the Aztec's special teams.

GRIZZLY CUP WINNERS
1921: Larry Higbee (football/basketball/baseball)
1922: Gil Porter (football/basketball/track)
1923: Gil Porter (football/basketball/baseball/track)
1924: Angus "Cammie" Meagher (football/baseball)
1925: Russ Sweet (football/basketball/track)
1926: Ted "Chief" Illman (football/basketball/baseball)
1927: Clarence Coyle (football/basketball/track)
1928: Ed Chinske (football/basketball/baseball)
1929: Tom Davis (football/track)
1930: Ray Lewis (football)
1931: Glenn Lockwood (basketball/track)
1932: Lowell Dailey (football)
1933: Dale Hinman (football/basketball)
1934: Al Dahlberg (football/basketball/track)
1935: Naseby Rhinehart Sr. (football/basketball/track)
1936: Henry Blastic (football/basketball)
1938: Bill Lazetich (football/basketball/track)
1940: Bob Thornally (football)
1941: Tom O'Donnell (football)
1942: Bill Jones (football/basketball)
1943: Henry Dahmer (football)
1948: Charles "Timer" Moses (basketball)
1949: John Helding (football/basketball/baseball)
1950: Jack O'Loughlin (football/baseball)
1951: Ray Bauer (football)
1952: Robert "Lefty" Byrne (football/basketball/baseball)
1953: Jack Luckman (basketball/track)
1954: Ed Anderson (football/basketball/baseball)
1955: Murdo Campbell (football/baseball)
1956: Dale Shupe (football/track)
1957: Don Williamson (football/baseball)
1958: Naseby Rhinehart Jr. (football/track)
1959: Mike Granbois (track)
1960: Rudy Ruana (skiing)
1961-62: Bob O'Billovich (football/basketball/baseball)
1963: Paul D. Miller (football)
1964: Tim Aldrich (basketball)
1965: William M. Rice (basketball/track)
1966: Gary B. Peck (basketball/baseball)
1967: Greg Hanson (basketball)
1968: Willie Jones (football/track)
1969: Mick Harrington (track)
1970: Roy Robinson (football/track)
1971: Lonzo Lewis (football/basketball)
1972: Steve Okoniewski (football)
1973: Earl Tye (basketball)
1974: Robin Selvig (basketball)
1975: Rock Svennungsen (football)
1976: Dean Erhard (track/cross country)
1977: Marsha Hamilton (gymnastics/track)
1978: Tim Kerr (football)
1979: Ed Cerkovnik (football)
1980: Craig Zanon (basketball)
1981: Rocky Klever (football)
1982: Greg Iseman (football)
1983: Brian Salonen (football)
1984-86: Larry Krystkowiak (basketball)
1987: Scott Zanon (basketball/track/football)
1988-2008: No Grizzly Cup awarded
2009: Jordan Hasquet (basketball), Jade Roskam (volleyball)
2010: Anthony Johnson (basketball), Lauren Beck (basketball)
2011: Erik Stoll (football), Jaimie Thibeault (volleyball)
2012: Bryan Waldhauser (football), Katrina Drennen (cross country/track and field)
2013: Mathias Ward (basketball), Olivia Weber (golf)
2014: Brock Coyle (football), Jordan Sullivan (basketball)
2015: Jordan Gregory (basketball), Brooke Moody (soccer)
2016: Tyrone Holmes (football), McCalle Feller (basketball)
2017: Brandon Gfeller (basketball), Sammy Evans (track and field)
2018: Fabijan Krslovic (basketball), Delene Colburn (softball)
2019: Michael Oguine (basketball), Erika McLeod (track and field)
2020: Dante Olson (football), McKenzie Johnston (basketball)
2021: No Grizzly Cup Awarded due to pandemic
2022: Oisin Shaffrey (men's tennis), Taylor Hansen (soccer)
2023: Robby Hauck (football), Holly Sudol (track and field)

University of Montana Athletics

Related News

Players Mentioned

Robby Hauck

Holly Sudol

Related Videos