Amy Bilquist & Lauren Barber among 585 Nominated for NCAA Woman of the Year

A record 585 female college athletes have been nominated by their member schools for the 2019 NCAA Woman of the Year Award. Established in 1991, the NCAA Woman of the Year award recognizes graduating female college athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves in academics, athletics, service and leadership throughout their collegiate careers.

• Click here to read the full list

In total 37 swimmers and 3 water polo players were selected for the award. That includes Cal Tech’s Brittany Percin, who both swims and plays water polo.

Among the most recognizable names in a list of necessarily-elite athletes are:

• Cal’s Amy Bilquist, who was the 2019 NCAA runner-up in the 100 yard backstroke. She earned Cal’s Neufeld Scholar-Athlete Award for having the highest GPA among all of the school’s senior female student-athletes lat year, among numerous other honors in and out of the pool.
• Navy’s Lauren Barber, who is a 3-time Patriot League swimmer of the Year (in addition to Rookie of the Year as a freshman) and a 3-time NCAA Championship qualifier. In 2019, she became the first Navy & Patriot League woman swimmer to score at the NCAA Championships when she placed 16th in thee 200 breaststroke at NCAAs. She was also a perfect 12-for-12 in individual titles and 16-for-16 in relay titles at the Patriot League Championships.
• Bryant’s Jillian Rice, the 2019 NEC Swimmer of the Meet, NEC Women’s Scholar Athlete of the Year, and Bryant Athletics Female Athlete of the Year.
• Texas A&M’s Lisa Bratton, who is a 15-time All-American and 2018 Short Course World Champion. She carried a 3.671 GPA overall in her undergraduate career and a 3.904 GPA in her major of ocean engineering. arlier this year, she was awarded a $10,000 NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship and received a prestigious $10,000 H. Boyd McWhorter Postgraduate Scholarship from the Southeastern Conference. The Richland, Wash. native was also named the SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year for swimming and diving and the Bill Erwin Scholar-Athlete of the Year in 2018. She is pursuing her master’s degree in ocean engineering while training for the 2020 Olympic Games.To be eligible for the award, an athlete must have earned a varsity letter in an NCAA-sponsored sport and completed eligibility in that sport.
• Arizona 7-time NCAA All-American Katrinka Konopka.

In this round, each school was eligible to nominate female student-athletes who are graduating and have completed their eligibility. Next, each conference will select up to two conference nominees from the pooled school nominees (in sports where teams compete in a conference outside of their normal conference, there is a special pool created). Then, that list is reduced to 30 athletes – 10 from each of the NCAA’s 3 divisions

In September, 9 finalists (3 from each division) will be named, with an awards ceremony honoring the final 30 in Indianapolis on Sunday, October 20th. The NCAA Woman of the Year selection committee chooses the ultimate winner.

Full List of  Swimmers, Divers, and Water Polo Players Nominated: