Men's, Women's CC Squads Named to Academic All-American Team

Men's 3.27 GPA ranked 32nd in nation, Women's 3.41 took 72nd

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The women's cross country team followed up a MAC Championship with an USTFCCCA Academic All-American honor.
 
The women's cross country team followed up a MAC Championship with an USTFCCCA Academic All-American honor.
  
 

Feb. 27, 2008

Complete USTFCCCA Release and GPA Rankings Get Acrobat Reader

 

NEW ORLEANS, La. - One day after Craig Leon was selected individually as a United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coach's Association Academic All-American, his teammates have joined him.

 

Both the Bobcats' men's and women's cross country squads were named to the USTFCCCA Academic All-American teams. The men's team's 3.27 grade point average ranked it 32nd in the nation while the women's team's 3.41 GPA placed it 72nd amongst all 325 nationwide teams.

 

The men sported the highest ranked team GPA from the MAC while the women finished fifth amongst league teams with Bowling Green (11th, 3.63 GPA) leading the conference.

 

This was the second straight year both the Ohio men's and women's cross country teams have earned the national honor.

 

For a team to be considered for the USTFCCCA All-Academic Team award, they must have competed and compiled a team score at an NCAA Regional Meet. The team must also have a minimum 3.00 team cumulative grade point average.

 

In all, 158 Division I women's programs received the USTFCCCA All-Academic Team honor.  There are 325 teams in Division I that sponsor women's cross country.  Of the 158 teams on the list, 35 of them had team GPAs over 3.50.  South Florida, from the Big East Conference, led all schools with a team GPA of 3.78. 

 

Thirty-one teams competed at the NCAA Championships this past November and of those 31, an unprecedented 26 teams received the All-Academic Team award, an astonishing 84 percent of the field.  This included eight teams in the top ten. 

 

The Big 12 Conference and the Atlantic Coast Conference had the most programs on the All-Academic Team list with ten apiece.  The Big East Conference, Big Ten Conference and the Missouri Valley Conference each had nine teams on the list. 

 

On the men's side, Belmont University of the Atlantic Sun Conference had the highest overall team grade point average with a 3.57.  Overall, 98 men's Division I programs received the USTFCCCA's academic honor, which is just under a third of all Division schools that sponsor men's cross country (299).  The numbers at this year's NCAA Championships were also impressive: 16 of the 31 teams in the field received the All-Academic Team award. 

 

The Atlantic Coast Conference, the Big East Conference, and the Southeastern Conference each had seven schools represented on the USTFCCCA All-Academic Team list.  The Big Ten Conference, the Missouri Valley Conference, and the Ivy League were represented with six teams on the list.