ENMU Athletics News Greyhounds Claim Academic Excellence Award
Lone Star Conference Interim Commissioner Jay Poerner announced in December that the Eastern New Mexico Athletics men’s teams earned the inaugural Lone Star Conference Academic Excellence Award presented by Balfour. The Hounds claimed the men’s award, while Texas Woman’s University was the women’s honoree for the athletic departments with the highest collective team GPA among its sports teams for the 2013-14 academic year. The Greyhounds and Pioneers each received $2,500 along with a custom trophy. “This award was established to highlight the league’s pursuit of academic excellence while recognizing outstanding academic achievement of LSC studentathletes, individual sport programs and athletic departments,” says LSC Interim Commissioner Jay Poerner. “We are appreciative of Balfour for their support of this award.” ENMU posted the top team GPA in two sports—football and men’s soccer— including two individuals with 4.0 GPAs. They also came in second in baseball. The Zias took fourth place in the women’s standings. The award winners were determined by a point system, with points distributed according to finish by sport in which there 14
Green & Silver | May 2015
is a NCAA Division II Championship after a conference-wide comparison of team GPAs. The member institution with the highest team GPA in each sport was named the sport’s Academic Champion and earned five points toward the overall award. Each sport’s runner-up picked up four points, and third-place earned three points toward the overall award. Any program with a Team GPA of 2.00 or above earned one point. Points for each member institution were totaled by gender and then divided by that institution’s number of counter programs in that gender to arrive at the comparison value. “Congratulations to our Greyhound coaching staff and student-athletes on this great achievement. We strive to make sure our student-athletes do things in that order: student first and athlete second. We are proud they are excelling both in the classroom and in competition,” says ENMU Senior Woman Administrator Sara Hill.
Greyhound and Zia Basketball Both Compete In Lone Star Conference Tournament
Both the Greyhound and Zia basketball teams reached the Lone Star Conference tournament, with the men’s team qualifying for the fifth straight season and the women returning after a one-year hiatus. The Zias are greatly improved from last season’s squad and have nine wins, which
includes five LSC victories. During the 2014-15 campaign, Eastern has continually shown resiliency, including a rally from 22-points down for a road win at Angelo State and the first season sweep of the Rambelles since 1996-97. During the season, senior forward Tori Tucker also earned LSC Offensive Player of the Week twice. The Greyhounds got off to a quick start and reached the century mark twice for the first time since the 2011-12 season. They also showed a knack for winning close games, as displayed by winning six of their first seven games by eight points or less. Eastern showed its toughness just weeks after a 16-point home loss to regionally-ranked Texas-Permian Basin by defeating the Falcons on their home floor. While both teams were defeated in the first round of the tournament, their studentathletes garnered all-conference team awards as well as all-conference academic team awards. For the Zias, senior forward Tori Tucker and junior guard Sarah Stinnett both earned Second Team All-LSC, while junior guard Jordyn Cooper was chosen to the LSC All-Academic Team. Greyhound junior guard, John Gilliam, was named to the All-Lone Star Conference team as an honorable mention.
Diamond Zias Off to Strong Start
At the start of the second season under the reign of Zia Softball Head Coach
