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Augsburg College Athletics 2004-05 Academic Achievements 2003-04 ACADEMIC AWARDS -- CLICK HERE At Augsburg College, the athletic program is part of an overall effort to help students grow as whole persons -- in mind, body and spirit. In that regard, the college takes special pride in the academic achievements of its student-athletes. Augsburg student-athletes set a new milestone for academic performance in 2004-05, as a record four athletes earned ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America honors from the College Sports Information Directors of America. Wrestlers Mark Matzek (Sr., Ellsworth, Wis.) and Ryan Valek (Jr., Belle Plaine, Minn.) earned Academic All-America men’s at-large honors, while baseball player Darren Ginther (Jr., Crystal, Minn./Robbinsdale Armstrong HS) and track and field/cross country athlete Riley Conway (Sr., Red Wing, Minn.) earned Academic All-America honors in their respective sports. The four Augsburg student-athletes earning the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America honors are the most in a single year in school history. Since 1981, Augsburg student-athletes have earned 17 Academic All-America honors from CoSIDA. The ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America program is administered by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA). Top student-athletes from non-Division I programs, who have already earned Academic All-District first-team honors, are eligible for inclusion on the team. Student-athletes must have a grade-point average above 3.20 (4.0 scale) and have outstanding athletic credentials. The Academic All-America ballot is voted on by a committee of CoSIDA members. In addition to the four Academic All-Americans, Augsburg had three other student-athletes earn ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District V honors, saluting the top student-athletes in a four-state area of the Midwest. Women’s hockey players Lauren Chezick (Sr., Hastings, Minn.) and Laura Prasek (Sr., Fridley, Minn.) were named to the Academic All-District V women’s at-large second team, and Millie Suk (Jr., Rochester, Minn./Mayo HS) earned Academic All-District V first-team honors in women’s soccer. Matzek, a first-team men’s at-large Academic All-America honoree, won NCAA Division III individual national titles at 133 pounds in both his junior and senior campaigns, while earning NCAA Division III All-American honors three times and compiling a 129-21 career record. He had 17 pins, 18 technical falls and 19 major decisions in his career. Finishing his collegiate career with a 42-match winning streak, Matzek dominated his weight class in the 2004-05 campaign, finishing 34-0 on the season to repeat as national champion at 133 pounds, one of four Auggies to repeat as national champions with unbeaten campaigns. In the process, he joined a select group of nine Auggie wrestlers in school history to win multiple national championships. He went 35-4 to win the national title at 133 in 2003-04, while finishing fourth nationally with a 40-7 record in 2002-03. Academically, Matzek is a mathematics and secondary education major with a 3.408 grade-point-average. He earned the school's Senior Honor Athlete award in 2005, the highest honor Augsburg gives to student-athletes. He earned National Wrestling Coaches Association Division III Scholar All-America honors three times. He was a member of Augsburg academic national teams in wrestling that ranked sixth twice (2003, 2005) and third (2004) in team grade-point-average nationally. Ginther, a first-team Academic All-America selection in baseball, is a secondary education/social studies major with a 3.81 grade-point average. He also earned All-Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference honors as well as American Baseball Coaches Association/Rawlings All-Midwest Region second-team honors in 2005. Ginther finished as one of the top hitters in the MIAC this year, with a .413 average, to go with team highs in hits (59), runs (35), extra-base hits (17), slugging percentage (.608) and on-base percentage (.494), with 19 multiple-hit games. He was Augsburg's fourth .400 hitter since 1988. He finished the regular season with eight doubles, seven triples and two homers. As Augsburg's No. 2 starting pitcher, Ginther finished with a 4.10 ERA and 6-3 record in 12 starts. Ginther is hitting .395 in his two seasons at Augsburg, with 103 hits, 73 runs scored, 53 RBI, a .586 slugging percentage and a .482 on-base percentage. In his pitching career (21 appearances, 20 starts), he has a 4.23 ERA with 67 strikeouts and a .256 opponent batting average. Conway, a second-team Academic All-America honoree, was the Auggies' top runner in all seven cross country competitions in 2004, establishing a personal best in his final competition, earning all-region honors with a 29th-place, 26:21 finish (8,000 meters) at the 2004 NCAA Division III Central Regional in November. At the MIAC championships in October, he earned all-conference honorable-mention honors, finishing 16th with a 27:28.8 time over 8,000 meters. He missed 15th place, and All-MIAC honors, by just three seconds. He was the team's No. 2 runner in 2003 and No. 4 runner in 2002. In track and field, Conway earned All-MIAC honors with a third-place finish in the men's 10,000-meter run (32:20.63) at the 2005 outdoor conference championships in May. He also had a second top-10 finish for the Auggies with an eighth-place finish in the 5,000-meters (15:28.50). In the indoor season, Conway finished 12th at the conference championships in the 3,000 (9:01.53), while setting a school record as part of the distance-medley relay squad (10:47.17). Conway, a senior, had a perfect 4.000 grade-point average and graduated summa cum laude with an English major in May. He was an Academic All-MIAC selection his junior and senior years in both track and field and cross country, and earned NCAA Division III Cross Country Coaches Association Scholar All-America honors his senior year. Valek was a third-team men’s at-large Academic All-America honoree. He earned wrestling All-American honors for the second time in his career in the 2004-05 campaign, finishing second nationally at 165 pounds with a 34-7 record. He finished the season with six pins, a technical fall and five major decisions in his run to the national runner-up finish. In his three seasons at Augsburg, Valek has a 92-35 career record, with 24 pins, two technical falls and 14 major decisions. He finished 38-10 in his sophomore season of 2003-04 to finish seventh nationally at 165 pounds in his first trip to the national tournament. Academically, Valek is an accounting major with a 3.789 grade-point average. He has earned National Wrestling Coaches Association Division III Scholar All-America honors in both 2004 and 2005. Augsburg College's All-Time CoSIDA Academic All-Americans: In wrestling, Augsburg finished in the top 10 in the National Wrestling Coaches Association's Scholar All-America team program for the eighth straight year, finishing sixth among more than 100 NCAA Division III wrestling institutions with a 3.331 team grade-point-average. Eight Auggies earned NWCA Scholar All-American honors. Each of the past eight years, Augsburg has had a team grade-point-average of over 3.30, and Augsburg is the only school in NCAA Division III wrestling to finish in the top 10 both in competition on the mat and in the academic team competition in each of the eight years that the NWCA has awarded an academic team national championship. Over the past 22 seasons, Augsburg has produced 89 NWCA Scholar All-Americans, the most of any college in any division in the nation. Augsburg has had at least three Scholar All-Americans every year since 1993, and has had 66 athletes honored since 1997. Matzek and Valek joined fellow All-Americans Jared Evans (Jr., Blue Earth, Minn./Blue Earth Area HS) and Justin Sorensen (Jr., Owatonna, Minn.) as NWCA Scholar All-Americans, along with Joe Cullen (Sr., Coon Rapids, Minn.), Kirk Rall (Jr., West St. Paul, Minn./Henry Sibley HS), Josh Hansen (So., Albert Lea, Minn.) and Jeremiah Knabe (Sr., Jackson, Minn./Jackson County Central HS). In women’s hockey, Chezick and Prasek joined teammates Britt Pennington (Jr., St. Cloud, Minn./Tech HS) and Jana Ford (Sr., Eagan, Minn.) as American Women’s Hockey Coaches Association Scholar-Athlete awardees. Seven Augsburg softball players -- Jodi Boyd (Jr., Hartley, Iowa/Hartley-Melvin-Sanborn HS), Brenda Grabau (Sr., Fountain, Minn./Fillmore Central HS), Trista Gundersen (So., Lino Lakes, Minn./Centennial HS), Amanda Lemke (So., Cologne, Minn./Waconia HS), Marissa Lindback (So., Minneapolis, Minn./South HS), Lisa Uehling (So., Rochester, Minn./Mayo HS) and Ashley Westerman (Fr., Bemidji, Minn.) -- earned National Fastpitch Coaches Association Scholar-Athlete honors. In 2004-05, 41 Augsburg student-athletes earned Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Academic All-Conference recognition. To earn MIAC Academic All-Conference recognition, student-athletes must be a sophomore, junior or senior (no freshmen or first-year transfers) and must have a cumulative grade-point average of 3.50 (4.00 scale). Athletes must be a member of a MIAC-sponsored varsity sports team and must have competed in at least 50 percent of a team's varsity regular-season contests in team sports or earn specific accomplishments in individual sports. Here is a listing of Augsburg College student-athletes receiving 2004-05 MIAC Academic All-Conference recognition, broken down by sport: Football: Joe Cullen, Kyle Danner, Adam Hoffmann, Ryan Koelsch, Andrew Neumann, Ross Peroutka, Craig Pike, Ryan Shea. To return to Augsburg Athletics, click here Augsburg College, a college of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, is a member of the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) and the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division III. This is the official web site for Augsburg
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