INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. – A total of 33 McKendree University student-athletes earned the Brother James Gaffney Distinguished Scholar Award from the Great Lakes Valley Conference (GLVC) for the 2021-22 academic year. The league announced the league record 581 individuals who received this year's honor on Wednesday.
The award, which is named after Brother James Gaffney FSC, who was a former President of Lewis University for over 28 years and a two-term Chair of the GLVC Council of Presidents, is presented annually to student-athletes competing in GLVC-sponsored sports who achieve a 4.0 grade point average during the course of the most recent completed academic year. The total number of honorees include the 15 full-time GLVC members as well as eligible associate league members.
With their 33 student-athletes, McKendree is one 10 schools in the league with 30 or more student-athletes named to the Brother James Gaffney Distinguished Scholar Award list as Lindenwood leads the way with a total of 79 student-athletes, while Missouri S&T was second with 69 and Rockhurst was third with 54. Indianapolis is next with 51 and Southwest Baptist had 50 recognized. The other schools besides McKendree with 30 or more honorees were Truman State (42), Drury (36), Maryville (31) and Southern Indiana (31).
Among the 33 Bearcat student-athletes selected to this year's GLVC Brother James Gaffney Distinguished Scholar Award recipients, eight are repeat selections from last season and the repeat selections are women's basketball redshirt freshman guard
Lauren Stolzman (Hudson, Wis./Hudson), women's lacrosse junior goalie
Clara Andrews (St. Louis, Mo./Nerinx Hall), women's soccer sophomore midfielder/forward
Destiny Johnson (Maryville, Ill./Collinsville), junior men's swimmer
Noah Fishel (Indianapolis, Ind./Southport), senior women's swimmer
Hallie Dixon (Jeffersonville, Ind./Jeffersonville), senior women's swimmer
Haley Rey (Columbia, Ill./Columbia), junior women's volleyball outside hitter
Maddie Misner (Makanda, Ill./Carbondale) and graduate student men's wrestler
Vincenzo Scaletta (Harwood Heights, Ill./Ridgewood). Additionally, Fishel is a three-time selection and Dixon is a four-time honoree.
The McKendree honorees for the 2021-22 GLVC Brother James Gaffney Distinguished Scholar Award are listed below
(**-denotes number of years selected as Brother James Gaffney Distinguished Scholar):
