May 31, 2012

Breese, Smith earn CoSIDA Academic All-District

GROVE CITY, Pa. -- Grove City College junior cross country/track and field standouts Mary Kate Breese (Mercer, Pa./Mercer) and Ella Smith (Becker, Minn./Becker) both earned First Team Division III Academic All-District honors Thursday afternoon from Capital One and the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA).

As First Team selections, Breese and Smith both advance to the nationwide CoSIDA Academic All-America ballot. The Capital One/CoSIDA Academic All-America Team will be selected in June.

Breese earned her second straight First Team Academic All-District honor. She earned First Team All-Presidents' Athletic Conference in cross country in both 2009 and 2011 and captured Second Team All-PAC in 2010. Last fall, Breese finished fifth overall at the conference championships.

In 2010, Breese helped the women's cross country program earn its first-ever invitation to the NCAA Division III Championships after Grove City placed fifth at the NCAA Mideast Championships. Grove City again finished fifth at the Mideast Championships in 2011. Individually, Breese took 63rd at this year's regional meet.

Breese earned her first track and field letter this spring after competing as a distance specialist. She finished third in both the 5000 and 10,000 at the PAC Championships in Beaver Falls, Pa., April 27-28. Breese also qualified for the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Championships in the 5000 and took eighth May 18 in Troy, N.Y.

An accounting/finance major, Breese has earned a 4.00 cumulative grade-point average. She has been named to the Dean's List along with the conference's Academic Honor Roll. Breese has also earned the College's Presidential and Trustee Scholarships.

Smith has earned six total letters at Grove City. In cross country, she has earned All-Mideast and First Team All-PAC in each of her first three seasons. Smith took 19th at the 2011 Mideast meet after finishing fourth at the conference championships. Her efforts helped the Wolverines place fifth at the 2010 and 2011 Mideast Championships.

This spring, Smith earned her third track and field letter. She took second in both the 5000 and 10,000 at the conference championships and then finished ninth in the 5000 at the ECAC Championships.

Smith has recorded a 3.52 GPA while majoring in psychology and exercise science. She is a Dean's List student and has been named to the conference's Academic Honor Roll.

A total of 13 Grove City student-athletes earned First Team Academic All-District during the 2011-12 academic year. This is the first year that CoSIDA has based its Academic All-America program on individual divisions within college athletics.

Currently, CoSIDA honors student-athletes in NCAA Divisions I, II and III, along with a "College" division that includes NAIA institutions and junior colleges. Prior to this year, the College Division included NCAA Divisions II and III, as well as NAIA schools.

Grove City is now part of District IV for the CoSIDA Academic All-America program. District IV includes all of the NCAA Division III programs in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. 

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