Two new classes will be inducted into the Connecticut College Athletics Hall of Fame this weekend. Yesterday we highlighted the Class of 2024, and today we'll do the same for the Class of 2025.

The Connecticut College Athletics Hall of Fame will welcome two classes and a total of eight inductees in a special ceremony held on Friday, September 26 in the 1962 Room of the College Center at Crozier-Williams.  

The Class of 2025 includes three former student-athletes and one coach—James Butler P'10 (retired men's cross country/track & field coach), Astrid Kempainen '15 (women's soccer), Benjamin Parens '18 (men's lacrosse) and Valerie Urban '17 (women's swimming). 

The group will be honored on Friday evening with a formal dinner and induction ceremony at 7 p.m. 

Butler made his mark as a coach for the men's cross country and  men's and women's track and field teams for 30 years. In 2002, his cross country squad qualified for the NCAA Championships for the first time in program history. Following the season he was named New England Division III Men's Cross Country Coach of the Year, and in 2004 he added NESCAC Men's Cross Country Coach of the Year honors. Butler developed 14 NESCAC and New England Division III champions across his career, along with 23 individual NCAA Championship qualifiers and one relay squad. He also guided Michael LeDuc '14 to nine All-America finishes and three individual NCAA titles.  [read more]

Kempainen proved to be one of the best leaders in Connecticut College women's soccer history. She led the Camels to a 16-3-1 record in 2014, a season highlighted by the first-ever NESCAC team championship in school history. After dispatching Williams College in the conference title game, Conn College went on to claim its first NCAA postseason win since 1998 with a 3-1 victory over Swarthmore College in the opening round of the NCAA Championship. Just the second player in program history to earn NESCAC Player of the Year honors (2014), Kempainen closed out her senior year as a NSCAA First Team All-American and D3soccer.com First Team All-American. [read more]

Parens was the most dominant faceoff specialist in Connecticut College men's lacrosse program history. A three-time United States Intercollegiate Lacrosse Association All-American, he became the first Camel in program history to earn first team All-America honors in 2016 and then repeated the feat a year later. He was a three-time All-NESCAC selection and two-time Nike Specialist of the Year, and he remains the program's all-time leader in ground balls (475) and faceoff wins (853). A two-year team captain and Anita L. DeFrantz Award winner, Parens led the team to a national ranking in 2018, the program's first in five years. [read more]

Urban made her mark in the pool, leading the women's swimming and diving team to one of the best four-year stretches in program history. During her career, she helped the team finish in the top six of the NESCAC Championships all four years, with a program-best third-place showing in 2017, as well as two top-15 finishes at the NCAA Championships with a program-best 10th place in 2017. The 2015 NESCAC champion in the 1,000 freestyle, Urban was a six-time All-American and a 2017 NCAA Woman of the Year nominee. A team captain and Brown-Brooks Award winner, she ended her career with program records in the 500 freestyle, 1,000 freestyle, and the 1,650 freestyle. [read more]    

The Connecticut College Athletics Hall of Fame was created to honor those who have brought distinction to themselves and Connecticut College through their achievement, commitment, sportsmanship, and leadership in athletics. Hall of Fame inductees may include alumni, coaches, faculty, administrators, or friends of the Connecticut College community, as well as teams that are exceptionally distinguished through outstanding achievement or significant accomplishment. A total of 120 individuals and two teams have been enshrined since 1989.