ACADEMIC EXCELLENCE: STUDENT-ATHLETES

ACU student-athletes have been awarded 33 prestigious NCAA Postgraduate Scholarships since 1966, with former track and field standout Charles Christmas as the first recipient. Those winners represent the fifth-highest total among all universities and colleges in the state, behind only Texas, Trinity, Rice and SMU.

Sixty-two Wildcat student-athletes also have been voted and/or named Academic All-America on 84 occasions, with 16 of them earning multiple academic all-America honors. The first was football player Jack Griggs in 1963 (first team), and the most recent are football players Jack Gibbens (first team) in 2019 and Josh Fink (first team) in 2018, women’s softball player Brianna Barnill in 2018, women’s soccer player Kelsie Roberts (first team) in 2016, distance runner Daniel Block in 2015, and tennis players Micah Hermsdorf and Hans Hach in 2013. 

Football players Don Harrison (1973-75), Greg Stirman (1973-75) and Bill Clayton (1987-89); tennis players Robby Scott (1993-95) and Julie Mavity (1997-99); and pole vaulter Katie Eckley (2003-05) were named Academic All-America three times.

As a senior in 2020, Gibbens was named a finalist for the Walter V. Campbell Trophy, known as the academic Heisman. The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame annually recognizes an individual with the award as the best in the nation for his combined academic success, football performance and exemplary leadership.