Eastern Student-Athletes Lead Way in OVC

BRENTWOOD, Tenn. – On Monday it was announced that 238 Ohio Valley Conference student-athletes have earned the OVC Academic Medal of Honor for the 2017-18 academic year with Eastern Illinois leading the way with a conference high 30 selections.

The OVC Academic Medal of Honor is given annually to the student-athletes who achieves the highest grade point average in a Conference-sponsored sport. Every Academic Medal of Honor recipient for the 2017-18 academic year carried a perfect 4.0 grade point average.

Of the 238 award winners, 31 were awarded Academic Medals of Honor for multiple sports (and counted just once in the final recipients list).

Eastern Illinois had the most selections with 30, followed by Eastern Kentucky (28) and Jacksonville State (28). The sport of women's track and field had the most honorees league-wide (40).

The 238 recipients is the second-most in a single academic year in the history of the award (trailing only the 248 honorees from 2015-16). Over the past five years there have been 1,097 student-athletes earn the OVC Academic Medal of Honor.

The OVC will announce the recipients of the Commissioner's Honor Roll, the Academic Achievement Award and the Team Academic Achievement Awards later this week.

Baseball: Matt Albert

Women’s Basketball: Taylor Steele

Men’s Cross Country: Jaime Marcos

Women’s Cross Country: Kate Bushue, Chloe Irish, Shelby Siltman

Football: Aaron Callaway, AJ Hantak

Men’s Golf: Charlie Adare, Alex Gowin

Women’s Golf: Katlyn Hasprey

Women’s Soccer: Carrie Caplin, Lindsey Carlson, Angela Corcoran, Madi Fisher, Kate Olson

Softball: Taylor Monahan, Valerie Thompson

Men’s Tennis; Gage Kingsmith

Women’s Tennis: Abby Carpenter, Claire Martin, Srishti Slaria, Grace Summers

Men’s Track: Justin Goff

Women’s Track: Kaitlyn Ebert, Sophia Keith, Louisa Rieger, Darneisha Spann

Volleyball: Abby Knight, Katie Sommer