In varsity sports, maintaining good grades is as important as scoring goals and sinking baskets for student athletes.
Fortunately for the UNBC Timberwolves men's and women's soccer and basketball teams, 15 athletes of the 70 who played for those teams in the 2013-14 season took that message to heart. They responded with performances worthy of inclusion on the CIS Academic All-Canadian team.
Seven on the list were repeat winners, including Harjas Grewal (biochemistry major), Logan Phenuff (biomedical studies), Chanandeep Sangha (biochemistry) and David Chin (biochemistry), who all played for the men's soccer team. Other repeat winners were Katia Hartwig (biochemistry) of the T-wolves women's soccer team, and women's basketball team members Sarah Robin (biology) and Jasprit Nijjar (biomedical studies).
Making the Academic All-Canadian team for the first time were soccer players Mitchell MacFarlane (history), Liam MacPhail (environmental engineering), Hannah Rizun (political science), Ashley Anderson (biomedical studies) and Tanya Grob (biomedical studies) as well as basketball players Emily Kaehn (integrated science), Jennifer Bruce (integrated science) and Devin McMurtry (history).
A reception to announce the academic team was held on Wednesday at UNBC.
To make the grade, each student athlete must achieve a grade-point average of 3.67 or better (out of a possible 4.0). Last season, a record 2,861 students attending CIS universities across the country were named to the Academic All-Canadian team, up from the previous record of 2,695 set in the 2012-13 school year.
