ECAC Announces Robbins Scholar Athletes
CAPE COD, Mass. -- ECAC Commissioner Rudy Keeling announced today the 2006-07 ECAC Robbins Scholar-Athlete Award winners.
Sponsored by Robbins Sports Surfaces, the Cincinnati-based sports surfaces company, the awards honor the outstanding academic and athletics achievements of student-athletes representing ECAC schools in Divisions I, II and III. One male and one female athlete from each division have been selected by their institutions. Three committees comprised of athletics administrators select two award winners in each division to be honored during the ECAC Convention at the Honors Dinner presented by Jostens on Sunday, September 30th. Votes are based on extraordinary achievements in academics, athletics and community service.
Caitlin "CJ" Ostrowski, a December 2006 graduate of Russell Sage College and Scott Stoner, a 2007 graduate of Stevens Institute of Technology have earned the Division III honors.
Ostrowski, a softball and volleyball student-athlete for the Gators has earned numerous honors and accolades in her career at Russell Sage. A two-time volleyball captain, Ostrowski helped lead RSC into two ECAC Tournaments (2005 and 2006) and a 2005 Independent Championship. In 2006 she finished 25th in the NCAA Division III statistical rankings with 4.42 kills per game. The previous year she finished 15th with 4.57 kills per game. Currently Ostrowski stands as the all-time career leader with 1411 kills and holds the record for single-season kills, kills/game and hitting percentage.
For her efforts, she was named 2006 American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) All-Region Honorable Mention, 2005 and 2006 New York State Women's College Athletic Association All-State First-Team, as well as several All-Tournament teams.
The Criminal Justice major graduated with a 3.931 grade point average. For three years, Ostrowski was named to the Russell Sage All-Academic Team as well as the 2005 and 2006 Game Plan/AVCA All-Academic Team. She has been a member of the Student-Athlete Advisory Council and has volunteered with Habitat for Humanity and the Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Prom Dress Collection.
Stoner, an outside hitter on the men's volleyball team helped the Ducks capture two North East Collegiate Volleyball Association (NECVA) Championships, in addition to three consecutive berths in the Molten Division III Men's Invitational Volleyball Championship. While at Stevens, he accumulated a total of 1,183 kills, 1,063 digs and 76 assists. The recognition he has earned for his impressive statistics include, NECVA All-Conference Second-Team honors (2006 and 2007), selection to the Molten Division III Championship All-Tournament Team (2006 and 2007), in addition to being chosen as the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) National Player of the Week during the 2007 campaign.
Graduating with a 3.79 cumulative grade-point average, the Engineering Management major was also chosen as an ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District At-Large selection. A member of several engineering honor societies, Stoner was consistently named to the Dean's list and participated in the Stevens Institute of Technology Scholars Program each of his four years on campus.
Off the court, Stoner has served on the Student-Athletic Advisory Board and the Stevens Political Awareness Committee. He has also volunteered in an outreach volleyball clinic for high school students in Staten Island, NY and raised money for Hoboken Homeless Shelters through selling pies prior to Thanksgiving. For the past two years Stoner has served as the webmaster for the NECVA Volleyball Conference. During which, he devised a quality of wins index to determine the playoff teams and seeding for the 32 team NECVA Conference. Stoner has accepted a position with the UBS Corporation working in the Operations Branch and began work there this summer.
The Division II honorees are Ashley Wallace of Pace University and Matthew Stopp of Assumption College, both of whom are recent graduates of their respective institutions.
Wallace competed as a forward on the women's basketball team and a thrower and sprinter on the outdoor track and field team. On the court she finished with 1,188 points, good for 11th place all-time in school history. In addition, she is one of twelve players in Setter history to score 1,000 points and grab 500 rebounds, totaling 645 rebounds for thirteenth place all-time. At the close of the 2007 season, Wallace ranked tenth in the NCAA in field goal percentage. She also earned Second-Team All-Northeast-10 (NE-10), First-Team All-Metropolitan, in addition to being selected to the Pace Holiday Classic All-Tournament Team and two-times receiving NE-10 Player of the Week honors. In the 2005-06 season, Wallace was named to the NE-10 Third-Team, selected Team Most Outstanding Player and Pace University Female Athlete of the Year.
Wallace didn't let down after basketball season, as she holds school records in the shot put, discus and 100 meter race. In 2006 she finished fifth in the shotput at the NE-10 Championship and won a gold medal in the Empire State Games.
The Mathematics/Secondary Education major graduated with a 3.97. Named to the Dean's List every semester, Wallace was a member of the Pace University Honors College and numerous honor society's. She was selected to the 2006 ESPN the Magazine Academic All-American District I College Division Second-Team as well as the 2005-06 and 2006-07 NE-10 All-Academic First-Team. An active member of the Student-Athlete Advisory Council, Wallace volunteered in numerous campus and community events.
Stopp has helped Assumption maintain its domination in men's tennis on the NE-10, helping the Greyhounds pick up of the conference crown four consecutive years. He also holds several impressive records for the Assumption College Men's Tennis Program. With an amazing .953, he has the highest winning percentage in singles matches (61-3) and is tied in the same category in doubles with a .930 (66-5). He is the all-time leader in school history with the most undefeated seasons in singles play (3), he sits fourth in all-time singles victories and fifth in all-time doubles victories.
From 2005-2007 Stopp did not lose in conference singles or doubles matches. He has appeared in four NCAA East Regional Tournaments, being a finalist three of those times. He was named the NE-10 Male Scholar-Athlete of the Year, after garnering NE-10 First-Team honors four consecutive years, in addition to being named to the NE-10 Weekly Honor Roll 38 times over the past four years. He was selected the to the 2007 CoSida/ESPN First-Team District 1 All-Region team, named a CoSida/ESPN Third-Team All-American at-large and was chosen as the 2007 Armand Desautel's Award as Assumption College's Premier Student-Athlete.
The Mathematics major graduated with a 3.91 overall GPA, ranking him seventh out 459 students in his class. He was named to the Dean's list eight straight semesters, and to the Northeast-10 Men's Tennis All-Academic team four consecutive years. He is the recent recipient of an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship. A Resident Assistant and a three-year member of SAAC, Stopp has participated in many volunteer projects in the Worcester area and his hometown of Altoona, Penn.
The Division I honorees, Brittany Lambertson and Luther Clement, both hail from St. John's University and will graduate in 2008.
Lambertson has participated in 100% of all the competitions for the St. John's women's golf team since 2004, including the 2004-05 Big East Championship, in which she placed sixth. She has continuously paced the Red Storm at the squad's number one spot. This past season she finished 12th at the Big East Championship. She helped SJU place in the top five on two different occasions. One of those times was at the Roar-ee Invitational at which Lambertson carded a two-round 149 to win the event.
In 2005-06, she was the runner-up at the Hartford Invitational, helping St. John's to capture its first team championship for the season. The season before, she was the low scorer for St. John's at the Indiana Invitational, finishing in sixth place with a 10-over par 154 and in just her first collegiate tournament she finished tied for 14th at the Dartmouth Invitational, shooting an 18-over par 162.
An active member of the community, Lambertson created, organized, ran and supervised four golf lesson fundraisers to raise money for ALS (Lou Gehrigs Disease) Research and a local teacher diagnosed with ALS. The event has raised a total of $30,000 and there will be more events to come. She has volunteered with several organizations including ALS Ride 4 Life, the Luke Neuhedel Foundation providing holiday gifts and necessities for families with children that have cancer and Newborns in Need - helping raise funds and collecting supplies for newborns that otherwise would have nothing.
The Elementary Education major currently boasts a 3.78 cumulative GPA, while being a Daniel Gale Sotheby's International Realty Licensed Salesperson. She was inducted into the Phi Eta Sigma Freshman Honor Society in the Spring of 2004. She has garnered Big East Academic All-Star honors and is a member of the Chi Alpha Sigma Student Athlete Honor Society.
Clement was a key contributor to the Red Storm fencing squad that claimed a second place finish at the NCAA Championships this past year. Clement took fifth place overall in men's saber and had an outstanding season, posting 37 wins prior to the NCAA Championships. The previous year he led the sabre squad with a 28-5 record during the regular season, helping the Red Storm men's team capture sixth place at the 2006 NCAA Championships . For his efforts he earned All-America honors after finishing in eighth place at the NCAA Nationals and third at the NCAA Regionals . He also competed internationally in Tunisia in the World Cup Grand Prix . He finished the year ranked in the top 50 out of 100 fencers, and placed seventh at the Senior World Cup in Sofia, Bulgaria over the summer.
The English major sports a 3.73 GPA, and has been named to the Dean's Honor Roll on several occasions. Clement is a new member to the Chi Alpha Sigma National College Athlete Honor Society. Selected as the St. John's University George Santelli Award Winner, in 2005-2006, for "the most outstanding member of the fencing team. Ability, character and academics are guidelines for this award."
An active participant in campus-wide and individual service projects, he has participated in University Service Day and several ongoing weekend fencing clinics. He is a SAAC member and works as a tutor on campus.
