CoSIDA Academic All-America release
BAY CITY, Mich - All three Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) student-athletes who were named to the 2016-17 CoSIDA Academic All-District Four Team for women's basketball at the NCAA Division II level were also named 2016-17 CoSIDA Academic All-Americans on Wednesday (March 1).
Saginaw Valley senior Emily Wendling landed First Team honors, while Ashland juniors Laina Snyder and Andi Daugherty each received Second Team recognition.
Wendling became the program's all-time leading scorer on Tuesday (Feb. 28) night in the team's GLIAC Tournament Quarterfinal victory over Northern Michigan. She currently has 1,931 points and has surpassed the previous mark of 1,922 points. Emily has maintained a 3.94 cumulative GPA as an occupational therapy student. This is the second such honor for Wendling, who was named to the CoSIDA Academic All-America Second Team for the 2015-16 campaign.
Snyder is averaging 17.7 points, 9.2 rebounds, 3.6 assists, 3.2 steals and 1.4 blocks per game, while hitting 51.3 percent from the field and 79.4 percent from the free-throw line. On Ashland's all-time lists, she is fifth in scoring (1,441 career points), fourth in rebounding (839 career rebounds) and tied for third in steals (257 career). A Business Management major, Snyder sports a cumulative grade-point average of 3.90 through the 2016 fall semester.
Daugherty is going for 14.8 points, 5.5 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 1.4 steals per contest this season, and hits 56.7 percent from the floor, 37.3 percent from 3-point range and 75.3 percent from the foul line. She is tied for seventh all-time in Ashland history with 1,370 career points, and her 52.5 percent career mark from the floor is fifth-best in Eagle history.
Daugherty becomes just the second player in the 50-season history of Ashland women's basketball to earn two Academic All-American honors, after also landing on the second team in 2015-16. Sue Rupp earned honorable mention in 1985-86 and a second-team citation in 1986-87. A Finance major, Daugherty's cumulative GPA through the fall of 2016 is 3.93.
Snyder and Daugherty are the first pair of Eagle women's basketball players to earn Academic All-American laurels in the same season since Kari Daugherty and Daiva Gerbec each landed on the first team in 2012-13. The Ashland women's basketball program now has 10 Academic All-American awards all-time.
To be eligible for Academic All-America® consideration, a student-athlete must be a varsity starter or key reserve, maintain a cumulative G.P.A. of 3.30 on a scale of 4.00, have reached sophomore athletic and academic standings at his/her current institution and be nominated by his/her sports information director. Since the program's inception in 1952, CoSIDA has bestowed Academic AllAmerica honors on more than 20,000 student-athletes in Divisions I, II, III and NAIA, covering all NCAA championship sports.
