By: Brandon Taylor, Assistant Sports Information Director
LA MIRADA, Calif. --- Biola student-athletes picked up 218 Academic All-PacWest honors for their work in the classroom during the 2019-20 school year, giving the Eagles the highest number of recognition in the conference for the third-straight year.
Biola improved its total by 23 from its 195 Academic All-PacWest honors in 2018-19. The 218 total is the most the Eagles have recorded in one year since joining the conference and helped them edge Azusa Pacific by five recognitions for the most in the PacWest. After the Cougars' 213, Concordia received 188 Academic All-PacWest honors, followed by Point Loma with 152 and Holy Names with 139.
Student-athletes who achieve at least a cumulative 3.0 grade-point average, completed at least two semesters at their institution and participated in regular season competition in a PacWest sponsored sport receive Academic All-PacWest recognition.
Biola Women's Track Field had the most recipients of any program in the PacWest with 39, an increase of 10 from 2018-19. Women's Soccer (29 honors), Men's Track (24) and Baseball (22) were the other programs that had over 20 student-athletes recognized, while Men's Track had the second-highest increase of Academic All-PacWest honors with eight more than last year.
Men's Cross Country and Men's Soccer also increased their number of honors by six this year. And the women's tennis team was the only Biola sports program that saw every member of its roster earn the scholar recognition. This is the third-consecutive year the Biola Women's Tennis has accomplished that feat.
The PacWest recognized 1,742 student-athletes with Academic All-PacWest honors this year, including 44 who maintained perfect 4.0 GPA's to set a new record for the conference in that category. Nine of the 4.0 GPA's belonged to Biola student-athletes: Tori Apodaca (SB), Jessica Cody (XC/T&F), Brendan Dowling (XC/T&F), Taylor Lawsen (XC/T&F), Kaitlin O'Brien (VB), Katelyn Penner (WSOC), Daniel Perez (XC/T&F), Heidi Sowers (T&F), Kaili Waller (XC/T&F).
The full breakdown of the Academic All-PacWest totals for each sport is listed below:
Academic All-PacWest By Sport
| Baseball |
22 |
| Softball |
8 |
| Women's Track & Field |
39 |
| Men's Track & Field |
24 |
| Women's Tennis |
9 |
| Men's Tennis |
3 |
| Women's Golf |
8 |
| Men's Basketball |
6 |
| Women's Basketball |
11 |
| Volleyball |
9 |
| Women's Cross Country |
16 |
| Men's Cross Country |
16 |
| Women's Soccer |
29 |
| Men's Soccer |
18 |
