MILWAUKEE – The month of February is usually a time when Panther fans can see their favorite student-athletes contending for championships and post-season seeding in winter sports, but there is one annual competition that wrapped up this week that took place behind closed boardroom doors.
 
Milwaukee Athletics and Northwestern Mutual partnered for their 10th annual Elevator Pitch event, which began two weeks ago with a pair of workshops. The purpose of the workshops was to instruct student-athletes on the value of being able to make a professional pitch and the steps for making an impactful pitch of their own.  The two workshops were led by Alex Marchan, Managing Director of Northwestern Mutual North Shore, and Troy Stewart, Financial Advisor on Marchan's North Shore team.
 
Of the 21 student-athletes who participated in the workshops, 16 went ahead and crafted a pitch of their own to try on a panel of judges this past Monday.  Student-athletes spent between 60 and 90 seconds attempting to make a lasting impression on five judges on the panel, which included Marchan and Stewart; Megan Resch, Director of District Operations for Northwestern Mutual North Shore; Adam Ahearn, Senior Associate Director of Athletics for External Relations with Milwaukee Athletics; and Andy Van Sistine, Assistant Director of Academic Services for Milwaukee Athletics.
 
The judges concluded that this year's winner of the Elevator Pitch competition was Noelle Bryan, a junior from Milwaukee's women's swimming & diving team.  Second place honors went to Jenna Soerens, a sophomore from Milwaukee's volleyball team, while third place went to Emma Duffy, a freshman from Milwaukee's volleyball team.
 
Milwaukee Athletics has enjoyed partnering with Northwestern Mutual on the spring Elevator Pitch event for the past decade. The support from Marchan's team included resources to conduct workshops with Panther student-athletes, judges for the competition, and incentives for the winners. To date, over 170 student-athletes have participated in either the workshops and/or the competition through the event's 10-year run, all of whom benefitted from the investment by Northwestern Mutual to help Milwaukee student-athletes sharpen their professional networking skills.