North Texas Student-Athletes Honored For Academic Success By Sun Belt Conference

Courtesy: University of North Texas

Release: 07/10/2009

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Courtesy: Angilee Wilkerson

DENTON, Texas (7/10/09) -North Texas sports teams combined to have 158 student-athletes land on the Sun Belt Conference Commissioner’s List and Academic Honor Roll for the 2008-09 school year.

Seventy-seven Mean Green athletes were named to the Commissioner’s List, which honors students recording a 3.5 GPA or better. The swimming and diving team led the way with 17 student-athletes receiving Commissioner’s List honors.

North Texas also had a total of 81 student-athletes named to the Academic Honor Roll, which is awarded to those maintaining a 3.0-3.49 GPA. The football team posted a department-high 25 athletes to this list. The women’s track and field team followed with 10 honorees.

The women’s golf team led all the Mean Green sports teams with a 3.38 overall GPA for the 2008-09 school year. Eight of the nine players from last year’s team were on one of the two lists.

The women’s swimming and diving team was not far behind. A combined 24 swimmers were named to either the Commissioner’s List or the Academic Honor Roll. They were tied for second, alongside women’s track, for most members of a Mean Green team being named to the combined two lists.

North Texas student-athletes have also been recognized nationally for their academic success.

The women’s tennis team earned a perfect 100 percent in the NCAA’s Graduation Success Rate in 2008, placing it among the nation’s best, and the women’s soccer team finished in the top 10 percent on the NCAA’s Academic Progress Report during the 2007-08 season. It was the second time in three years that head coach John Hedlund’s team has earned the NCAA’s top academic distinction by performing in the top 10 percent of all Division I women’s soccer programs.

The commitment to women’s athletics was also recognized. For the second consecutive year the Mean Green was crowned national champions of the annual Gender Equity Scorecard released by Penn State York.