ST. LOUIS, Mo. – For the second consecutive year, junior Danielle Lemek (Doniphan, Neb./Doniphan-Trumbull) has been named a First-Team Missouri Valley Conference Scholar-Athlete and fellow junior Allison Walsh (Mt. Prospect, Ill./Mt. Prospect) was an honorable mention Valley Scholar-Athlete according to an announcement by the league office Friday.
A marketing major with a 3.35 cumulative grade point average, Lemek is the ninth two-time First-Team Valley Scholar-Athlete in program history and is the only repeat first-team selection in the league in 2014-15 after garnering the award last year.
Lemek is the two-time MVC Player of the Year and fourth player in program history to earn All-MVC honors three times in their career. She led the MVC with a 74.28 stroke average, which ranks second in school history and is the third lowest average in Valley history. A six-time MVC Golfer of the Week selection in 2014-15, Lemek won three individual titles and posted seven top-10 finishes.
This season she completed a school-record stretch of 32 consecutive sub-80 rounds and her 27 rounds in the 70's or better in 2014-15 tied for the second-best season total in school history. A four-time Bradley Country Financial Scholar-Athlete of the Week this year, Lemek holds the Bradley career records for stroke average (74.47), medalist titles (9) and top-10 finishes (23).
Walsh earned honorable mention MVC Scholar-Athlete recognition for the second straight year. A two-time WGCA All-American Scholar, she owns a 3.96 cumulative grade point average in studio art painting.
In 2014-15, Walsh posted an 82.19 stroke average and collected one top-20 finish along with six sub-80 rounds. She posted her best finish of the season at the Bradley Invitational, where she tied for 16th.
Walsh carded a season-best 2-over 74 in the second round of the Pat Bradley Invitational. She will enter her senior year, 13th in program history with 37 career sub-80 rounds.
Bradley has had at least one player earn first-team MVC scholar-athlete honors in a conference record 18 consecutive years.
During the 18-year run, 13 Bradley student-athletes have garnered a total of 27 first-team scholar-athlete awards, seven better than Southern Illinois' 20 first-team scholar-athlete picks during that same time.
In fact, the Braves boast a total of 25 first-team scholar-athletes since the start of the 1999-2000 season, which is nine more than any other MVC member over that span. Bradley is second all-time in MVC women's golf scholar-athlete selections (28), behind Southern Illinois' Valley record 30 and the Braves have six more Valley scholar-athlete picks than any other league member.
The criteria for the MVC scholar-athlete team parallels the CoSIDA (College Sports Information Directors of America) standards for academic Capital One Academic All-America® program. Nominees must have at least a 3.20 cumulative grade point average (4.0 scale), while the student-athletes must have reached sophomore athletic and academic standing at their institutions and must have participated in at least 50 percent of her team's rounds or played at the State Farm MVC Championship.
