PSAC Names Spring 2005 Top Ten
PSAC Names Spring Top Ten
(June 15, 2005)
The Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference has named a group of outstanding student-athletes as the league’s Spring Top Ten Awards winners.
The Top Ten Awards, selected by the PSAC’s sports information directors, recognize student-athletes who distinguish themselves in the classroom, as well as in the arena of competition. The conference designates Top Ten Award winners after each of the sports seasons: fall, winter and spring.
To be a candidate for the Top Ten Awards, a student-athlete must have achieved a minimum of a 3.25 cumulative grade point average and must be a starter or key reserve with legitimate athletic credentials. Only student-athletes from the spring sports season are eligible for the Spring Top Ten Awards. Those sports are: baseball, golf, lacrosse, softball, men's and women's tennis, and men's and women's outdoor track & field.
At the end of the academic year, the league announces the Scholar-Athlete Awards, which recognize student-athletes on all PSAC squads with 3.25 cumulative GPAs or better. Additionally, the PSAC names the top Male and Female Scholar-Athlete of Year.
Following are biographical sketches of the PSAC’s 2005 Spring Top Ten recipients:
Christina Carpenter
Senior, Millersville
Women's Outdoor Track & Field (Landisville/Hempfield)...Carpenter carries a 3.55 GPA while studying elementary education. Most recently she defended her title as the PSAC champion in the 100m by capturing the gold for third straight, as well as the 200m champion for the last two years. Carpenter qualified in the NCAA Division II Championships in the 100m as her season-best time of 11.93 ranked 14th in country. She earned first place finishes in five out of six meets this spring in both the 100m and 200m races. Carpenter was awarded the 2005 Elwood J. Finley Award that honors Millersville's most outstanding female senior athlete.
Frank D’Agostino
Sophomore, Shippensburg
Baseball (Pine Grove/Pine Grove)...D'Agostino has earned a 3.595 GPA as an elementary education major. As the No. 2 starter in the team's pitching rotation this season, he collected a record of 7-3 with an ERA of 3.39, second lowest on the team. D'Agostino was third on the team in strikeouts with 59 and held his opponents to a .254 batting average. He was honored as the PSAC Pitcher of the Week after a complete game two-hitter in Shippensburg's 6-0 road victory against Slippery Rock. He is a nominee for ESPN the Magazine/College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) Academic All-America.
Jaime Dacey
Senior, Shippensburg
Softball (Langhorne/Archbishop Wood)...Dacey holds a 3.683 GPA as an elementary education major. She led the country in 2005 with an overall batting average of .549 as the only player in the PSAC to bat hit over .500 since the 1993 season. Dacey led the PSAC in six major statistical categories and was ranked nationally in RBI per game (9th - 1.23/gm), triples per game (3rd, - 0.23/gm) and slugging percentage (10th - .852). This year she broke single-season records at Shippensburg for triples (11), hits (78), RBI (58), batting average and slugging percentage. Due to her success, Dacey was named the 2005 PSAC Eastern Division Player of the Year. She is a four-time All-PSAC East selection, a two-time National Fastpitch Coaches Association (NFCA) All-American, a two-time Academic All-District II selection and was named first-team Academic All-America earlier this year.
Preston Gibbs
Sophomore, Slippery Rock
Men's Outdoor Track & Field (Hermitage/Hermitage)... Gibbs maintains a 3.86 GPA while studying business. Gibbs was a PSAC champion this past spring, pacing the field in the triple jump with a season best 47-7 1/2. He also placed second in the long jump. He was honored earlier this year as a PSAC Winter Top Ten Award winner after winning the long jump and the triple jump at the PSAC Indoor Track and Field Championships. In addition, Gibbs was named as the NCAA Division II Indoor Track East Regional Athlete of the Year by U.S. Track Coaches after qualifying for nationals in the triple jump. He was a three-time PSAC Athlete of the Week.
Laura Kline
Junior, Kutztown
Women's Outdoor Track & Field (Reading/Reading)... Kline boasts a 4.00 GPA while majoring in special education. A 2004 Fall Top Ten Winner as a member of the field hockey team, Kline also excelled on the track this year. She captured the PSAC Championship in the 400m hurdles with a stadium record and NCAA provisional time of 1:03.10 and was a part of the PSAC Champion 4x400 relay that ran a stadium record time of 3:53.01. Kline ran the fastest time in the PSAC all season in the 400m hurdles with a time of 1:03.05 at Lafayette. She also qualified for the PSAC Championships in the 200m and 400m races.
Clay Kuklick
Senior, Kutztown
Baseball (North Wales/North Penn)...Kuklick has earned a 3.34 GPA while studying elementary education. He batted .311 (47-151) with 36 runs scored, five doubles, three home runs, and 25 RBI on the season. He was named the Most Valuable Player of the 2005 PSAC Baseball Championship after helping to lead Kutztown to a the league title - its second in Kuklick's four seasons. The All-PSAC East Second Team selection was instrumental all season in handling a pitching staff that finished third in the PSAC in earned run average. He picked off 16-of-32 base runners. For his career, he hit .313 with 12 home runs and 83 RBI.
Mike LaRosa,
Senior, West Chester
Baseball (Exton/Bishop Shanahan)...LaRosa maintains a 3.39 GPA in the field of business management. A four-year starter at West Chester, he earned All-PSAC East Second Team honors this season after leading his team in batting with a .338 average, 59 hits, and had a fielding percentage of .938 at second base. He earned All-PSAC East First Team honors in 2003 and Second Team honors in 2004. LaRosa holds the WCU career record for hits (234) and is second in runs (166) and hit by a pitch (36).
Mike Larson
Senior, California
Baseball (Weyburn, Saskatchewan/Weyburn Comp)...Larson has established a 3.85 GPA while studying criminal justice. In 2005 he started 49 of California’s 50 games, and led the team in hits (62), triples (3), home runs (8), runs (43), RBI (49), total bases (107) and slugging percentage (.622). He also finished among the top three in doubles (15), walks (20) and stolen bases (14 in 15 attempts). He finished his career among California’s top five in batting average (.375), hits (191), doubles (43), at bats (505) and among top 10 in homers (18) and RBI (119). He was a 2004 Spring Top Ten Award winner and the 2004 PSAC Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year. Larson is a two-time CoSIDA Academic All-American, a two-time all-region player, and has made the Dean's List every semester at California.
Yvonne Niederbracht
Graduate Student, IUP
Women's Tennis (Petershagen, Germany)... Niederbracht boasts a 4.00 graduate GPA while studying in the field of sport science. Her undergraduate GPA at IUP was 3.77. She ended the season with a No. 1 singles record of 17-2 and a No. 1 doubles record of 9-6. Following the 2005 season, she was ranked fourth in the East Region and named as the East Region Senior Player of the Year from the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA). Niederbracht has made the Dean's List every semester at IUP - both graduate and undergraduate. After winning the PSAC singles title in 2004, she was selected as her sport's PSAC Female Athlete of the Year and was a Top Ten Award recipient. She helped lead her team to the PSAC tournament every year she played (2001, 2002, 2004 and 2005). Niederbracht ended her career with an overall singles record of 65-9 and a doubles record of 61-14.
Kelly Richards
Junior, Edinboro
Women's Outdoor Track & Field (Edinboro)...Richards holds a 3.97 GPA in the field of elementary education/special education. She ran a PSAC-best time of 10:56.78 in the 3,000m steeplechase earlier this season and qualified for nationals as the No. 12 seed. She then narrowly missed earning All-American honors for the second time in three years with her ninth-place finish. She also placed third in the 1,500m run at the PSAC Championships with a time of 4:49.81. Richards is three-time All-PSAC and All-East Region performer in cross country, a six-time National Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association All-Academic choice, and has made the Dean's List eight times at Edinboro.