Two Mountaineers Named 2017 Winter Scholar-Athletes of the Year
By Phil Poling
Two West Virginia University student-athletes were recognized Thursday by their respective sports’ head coaches in the Big 12 for both their academic and athletic performances.
Senior basketball player Nathan Adrian was voted Men’s Basketball Winter Scholar-Athlete of the Year by the Big 12 coaches. The Morgantown native is a graduate school sport management major with a 3.85 GPA and 100 percent participation during his senior season.
Adrian also earned All-Big 12 Defensive Team and All-Big 12 Third Team honors while starting all 37 games and leading the Mountaineers in rebounding. His presence is hard to quantify solely through statistics, but it’s obvious Adrian will be missed next year. He averaged 9.9 points, 6.0 rebounds and 2.9 assists per game for the ‘Eers in 2016-17.
The other Mountaineer named Winter Scholar-Athlete of the Year by Big 12 coaches was Amelie Currat of the swimming and diving team. Hailing from Dunkerque, France, the junior finance major boasts a 4.0 GPA while fully participating on the team.
Next: The Importance of Nathan Adrian
Following her performance at the 2017 Big 12 Swimming & Diving Championships, Currat was named All-Big 12 Second Team. Accolades are all too familiar, though; Currat was named to the Academic All-Big 12 Rookie Team her freshman season and has made the Academic All-Big 12 First Team for two consecutive years and running.
Adrian’s playing career for his hometown-Mountaineers is over, but Currat will have another stab at the award next season as a senior. The voting on these awards is laid out below from big12sports.com.
"“The Big 12 Conference established its Scholar-Athlete of the Year Award in 2012-13. A recipient is named in each conference-sponsored sport. Every Big 12 institution nominates one individual per sport with the winners selected by a vote of the league head coaches for that sport, who are not allowed to vote for their own student-athletes. Scholar-Athlete of the Year nominees must be a junior or senior (athletic and academic standing), have a cumulative grade point average of 3.20 or higher, participate in at least 60 percent of the team’s scheduled contests and have a minimum of one year in residence at the institution.”"