The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga student-athletes led the way with 27 honored on the 2015 Southern Conference All-Academic Team, the league office announced today. The Mocs edged Western Carolina (26) and Samford (22) for the most team members in the conference.
UTC also had a league-best four student-athletes maintain a perfect 4.0 cumulative grade-point-average heading into the spring semester. All members of the indoor track & field program, Maddison Melchionna, Joanna Elmore, Helenka Kis and Patrick O'Brien, make up four of the 11 4.0s across the SoCon.
To be eligible for the academic all-conference team, student-athletes must carry at least a 3.3 cumulative GPA entering the winter season and were required to compete in at least one-half of their teams’ competitions during the recently concluded campaign. In addition, the student-athletes must have successfully completed at least 24 credit hours in the previous two semesters.
The 27 Mocs on the Winter Academic All-SoCon team are a school record. A program-record 12 members of the women’s team indoor track & field team were honored, while the men tied a program mark with 10 for the second semester in a row.
Notables among the honorees are women’s basketball Defensive Player of the Year Alicia Payne, NCAA wrestling participant Jared Johnson, and the entire women’s indoor DMR SoCon Championship team of Melchionna, Amanda Cotter, Rebecca Greenwall and Kiaana Howard.