Orange Volleyball Earns 2018-19 AVCA Team Academic Award

SYRACUSE, N.Y. – Following one of the most successful season's in program history, the accolades continue for the Syracuse University volleyball team. The 2018 team is a recipient of the 2018-19 American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) Team Academic Award. The annual honor is awarded to teams who have achieved excellence in the classroom in addition to their dedication on the volleyball court. The award, which was initiated in the 1992-93 academic year, honors collegiate and high school volleyball teams that displayed excellence in the classroom during the school year by maintaining at least a 3.30 cumulative team grade-point average on a 4.0 scale

Thirteen members of the 2018 squad earned a spot on the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) Academic Honor Roll for 2018-2019, including Santita Ebangwese, a 2019 bioengineering graduate. This was Ebangwese's fourth consecutive year qualifying for the Honor Roll, in addition to being the 2018 ACC Volleyball Scholar-Athlete of the Year, a University Scholar for the Class of 2019, one of two 2019 Soladay Award Winners, a Third-Team Academic All-American, a 2018 Google Cloud Academic All-American, a four-time member of the ACC All-Academic Team, and Co-President of the University's Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC). Her stellar work off the court earned her NCAA and ACC Postgraduate Scholarships. Fellow senior Jalissa Trotter, a graduate in the School of Education with a major in Health and Exercise Science, also earned her spot on the ACC Academic Honor Roll for the fourth year in a row, was a member of SAAC and a 2018 All-ACC Academic Honoree.

Also among the honorees is rising junior middle blocker Dana Gardner, who posted a perfect 4.0 GPA, and standout freshman Polina Shemanova, who was included on the All-ACC First Team and the All-ACC Academic Team. Shemanova made an immediate impact for the Orange on the court in her rookie season, recording the most kills in a season by a freshman in program history (447) and was tabbed the ACC Freshman of the Year.

The Orange look to continue to build on the successes they achieved on and off the court as the academic year gets underway at the end of August, and the season begins on September 5^th when they take on Baylor in Madison, Wisc.

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Syracuse University Athletics

Orange Volleyball Earns 2018-19 AVCA Team Academic Award

Players Mentioned

Santita Ebangwese

Dana Gardner

Polina Shemanova

Jalissa Trotter

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