As winner of the 2017 North Coast Athletic Conference (NCAC) Pam Smith Award, recent Kenyon College graduate Ellie Crawford was moved forward as a conference nominee for the 2017 NCAA Woman of the Year Award.
Tuesday, the NCAA released the names of all 145 female student-athletes nominated by conferences and an independent selection committee. Those honorees, who came from a program-record pool of 543 nominees, represent college athletes from 16 different sports spanning all three NCAA divisions. Of those recognized, 58 nominees competed in Division I, 34 in Division II and 53 in Division III.
A four-year member of the Kenyon swim program, Crawford qualified for three NCAA Championship meets and collected four All-America awards. She concluded her senior season at Kenyon by earning an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship. She was a first-team Academic All-American as selected by members of the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) and was voted Kenyon’s 2017 NCAC Scholar-Athlete.
In early May, Crawford graduated summa cum laude as a physics major. She was a 2016 Barry Goldwater Scholarship recipient, a four-time College Swimming Coaches Association of America (CSCAA) Scholar All-American and a three-time member of the NCAC Academic Honor Roll.
In early September, the Woman of the Year selection committee will narrow things down to a list of the Top 30 honorees, which will include 10 women from each division. At the end of September, the selection committee will select and announce nine finalists, with three from each division. The NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics will then select the 2017 NCAA Woman of the Year from those finalists.
The Top 30 honorees will be celebrated and the 2017 NCAA Woman of the Year will be named at the annual banquet, to be held in Indianapolis, Indiana on October 22.
The NCAA Woman of the Year program has recognized graduating female student-athletes for excellence in academics, athletics, community service and leadership since its inception in 1991.