Galesburg, IL - Nearly 150 Knox College student-athletes are being recognized by the Midwest Conference for their performance in the classroom.
The MWC has announced its 2011-2012 Academic All-Conference recipients for the fall, winter, and spring athletic seasons. Knox had a total of 147 student-athletes in 20 sports named academic all-conference. The league’s 10 schools combined for 1,293 academic all-conference performers.
The Prairie Fire selections include 54 on the Midwest Conference Fall Academic All-Conference team, 47 on the Winter Academic All-Conference team, and 46 on the Spring Academic All-Conference team.
Football led the Knox fall teams with 18 academic all-conference honorees.
The Prairie Fire men’s and women’s indoor track and field teams each had 11 student-athletes earn academic all-conference to lead Knox’s winter squads. Women’s swimming was next with 10.
The spring team with the most academic all-conference selections was men’s outdoor track and field with 13 selections. Women’s outdoor track and field was next with nine, followed by softball with eight.
The Midwest Conference says the Academic All-Conference program revamped the criteria this year.
A minimum grade point average of 3.33 (3.2 in previous years) is required and is calculated only in the awarded academic season rather than the cumulative GPA. Another change to the program is the eligibility of freshmen along with sophomores, juniors, and seniors who letter in any of the MWC's fall, winter, or spring sports.
In addition, the MWC says 259 of the 1,293 award winners in 2011-2012 were multisport winners. A total of 131 recipients were honored in two sports while 128 were winners in three sports. Including the multisport winners, the conference handed out 1,552 awards - surpassing the 1,116 awards the previous season.
The Midwest Conference Academic All-Conference release, which has the names of all the honorees, is available online at: http://www.midwestconference.org/news/2012/6/20/GEN_0620123845.aspx
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