University of Minnesota Athletics
Elzen Named NWCA First Team Academic All-American
5/9/2002 12:00:00 AM | Athletics
Elzen, the 197-pound 2002 Big Ten Champion, placed third and fourth at the 2001 and 2002 NCAA Championships, respectively. He is a four-time U of M Scholar-Athlete and member of the Academic All-Big Ten team, and the recipient of the 2000-01 Academic Counseling and Student Services Outstanding Achievement Award.
Elzen maintained a GPA of 3.402 with a major in health and wellness. He was awarded a $5,000 NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship earlier this week. He has been accepted into the University's postgraduate accelerated nursing program.
Each year, the NWCA honors its Academic Top Twenty-five Division I wrestling teams, as well as a First Team, Second Team and Honorable Mention All-Academic Team. The All-Academic Team features wrestlers from 32 universities, 38 NCAA qualifiers, and 17 All-Americans. Sacred Heart University captured honors as being the top-ranked academic wrestling team with a team GPA 3.4.
"The results of the 2002 NWCA Academic All-American Rankings confirms the NWCA's belief that many of our nation's top collegiate wrestlers are committed to the highest level of achievement in the classroom as well as the wrestling mat," said Mike Moyer, Executive Director of the NWCA. "These results demonstrate that the sport of wrestling is building leaders for life as many of these athletes will go onto be our leaders of tomorrow."
NWCA Academic All-American First Team Name School GPA Major Wrestling Honors Ryan Bertin Michigan 3.907 Undecided 6th NCAA Champs. Owen Elzen Minnesota 3.402 Health & Wellness 4th NCAA Champs. Joe Heskett Iowa State 3.27 Speech Comm. 165 NCAA Champion John Lockhart Illinois 3.54 Kinesiology 3rd NCAA Champs. Otto Olson Michigan 3.70 Education Tech. 5th NCAA Champs. Eric Owen N. Ill. 3.61 Biology 5th NCAA Champs. Greg Parker Princeton 3.50 Computer Science 2nd NCAA Champs. Rob Rohn Lehigh 3.62 Accounting 184 NCAA Champion Jessman Smith Iowa 3.15 Psychology 3rd NCAA Champs. Bryan Snyder Nebraska 3.272 Sociology/Comm. 2nd NCAA Champs.
