150 All-Americans

Story by Stew Salowitz

In 2023, IWU scored its 150th Academic All-America team member. IWU is now the 24th across all NCAA divisions and 9th among all Division III schools.

When Rachel Anderson Lyons ‘08 graduated from Clinton (Ill.) High School, she decided to
attend Illinois Wesleyan because she liked the close-knit community with the track team
on the athletic side and the classroom size and accessibility of the professors on the
academic side.

Korey Coon ‘00 was a highly recruited basketball player at East Peoria (Ill.) High School
when he opted to attend IWU to further his educational and athletic careers. He cites the school’s academic reputation as a key factor, along with the elite success of the basketball program that included being able to play in front of a packed Shirk Center crowd for legendary coach Dennie Bridges.

Little did they know their eventual elections as Academic All-Americans would be building blocks that would lead, over the years, to an incredible milestone for the University.

When women’s golfer Lexi Onsrud and lacrosse player Sarah Gleason were elected to the first and third teams, respectively, as women’s at-large Academic All-Americans during spring 2023, it gave IWU 150 all-time selections with at least one selection in each of the past nine years.
With 65 members on the first national team, 42 on the second and 43 third team honorees, IWU’s total is 24th most across all NCAA divisions and ninth best among Division III schools.

All-American plaques in men’s basketball, the most among any school regardless of division. Such basketball luminaries as Duke, Kansas, Indiana and UCLA are tied for second with 20.

In addition, IWU is tied for fifth with 25 baseball Academic All-Americans and tied for
ninth with 21 softball honorees.

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Nominating and voting for Academic All-America is an exclusive right of College Sports
Communicators (CSC) members. The organization, until 2022, was known as the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA).

The first-ever team (football) was released in 1952, and since then, CSC has honored more than 40,000 deserving student-athletes across all divisions.

The first women’s Academic All-America team, for women’s basketball, appeared in 1980 and beginning in 1987, CSC has selected an Academic All-America team member of the year in each sport.

Currently, CSC sponsors Academic All-America programs for men’s soccer, women’s soccer, football, volleyball, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, men’s swimming and diving, women’s swimming and diving, men’s tennis, women’s tennis, baseball, softball and men’s and women’s track and field/cross country. All other championship sports are eligible through the at-large program.

Gaining an Academic All-American first requires a sports information professional to
identify a student-athlete worthy of nomination – a solid academic and athletic reputation is invaluable in the nominating and voting process. The student-athlete must be at least a sophomore, have a cumulative grade-point average of 3.50 (on a 4.0 scale) and have participated in a designated percentage of their team’s games.

“The unique part of the Academic All-America program is that it is both an athletic and
academic award, not just one or the other, so the nomination has to reflect that,” said Katie Gonzales, who has been IWU’s assistant athletic director for athletic communications since 2019. “We do our best to build strong nominations through the help of coaches and the student-athletes themselves to ensure that we are covering everything our student-athletes are involved in and have accomplished during their college career to that point.”

Less than 1 percent of all collegiate student-athletes are designated as Academic All- American and even earning Academic All-District is no small accomplishment as less than 5 percent of athletes claim that honor.

The election steps winnow large numbers of entrants — in 2022-23 there were 204,000 student-athletes competing at NCAA Division III schools that yielded 10,693 Academic All-District honorees and an eventual 541 Academic All-Americans.

A pioneer in stamping the Illinois Wesleyan imprint on the Academic All-America scene was Ed Alsene, the University’s director of publicity and sports information from 1965 to 1988. Alsene, who passed away in 2016, served as men’s district coordinator for the Academic All-America Committee from 1979 to 1989, supervising the nominating and voting process.

Elected to the CoSIDA Hall of Fame in 1986, Alsene was only the second person from a small, private school to be so honored and, in 1998, he was honored with the organization’s Lester Jordan Award for his contributions to the Academic All-America program.

“It is fitting that Ed Alsene was the first Division III communicator in the College Sports
Communicators Hall of Fame, because he was a pioneer in the business,” said Tom Lamonica, who was sports information director for 26 years at Illinois State University. “Edgar got me curious about the Academic All-America program because he used to come to our office to use the telecopier to send his AAA information. That inspired me to get interested in the process. As I learned from Ed and my mentor at ISU, Roger Cushman, the extra work to promote academics among student-athletes pays dividends in many ways.”

Like Alsene decades ahead of her, Gonzales is one of the volunteer CSC members who supervise the nominating and voting process, currently serving as the chair of the Academic All-America Committee.

A 2008 graduate, Lyons became a two-time first team Academic All-American (2007, 2008) and was named the women’s track Academic All-American of the Year in 2008. She is currently a hospital pharmacist at Warner Hospital and Health Services, a critical access hospital in her hometown of Clinton and, while she didn’t set out to be an Academic All-American, she values the honor bestowed on her.

“Typically, you aren’t intentionally competing for Academic All-American honors as it is
really out of your control,” she said. “But, ultimately, you are a student first and there really is no higher honor intertwining athletics and academics. I have always truly cherished that award as I feel like it most accurately reflects the time devoted to achieve success in both areas simultaneously.”

In her IWU athletic career, Lyons won seven total NCAA championships, six as an individual and became only the third woman in Division III history to win three consecutive indoor 400-meter titles. In 2019, she was the first IWU athlete to be inducted into the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association Division III Track & Field Athlete Hall of Fame.

“When I won the Academic All-America award, I was already set on my path after school to obtain my doctorate of pharmacy,” said Lyons. “I wouldn’t necessarily say it propelled me forward but more so, was an acknowledgment of my work to that point and confirmation to keep striving.”

Coon became a two-time first team Academic All-American and was selected as men’s basketball Academic All-American of the Year in 1999 and 2000.

Working for Caterpillar and based in Raleigh, N.C., Coon is vice president and general manager in Cat’s mini excavators and small bulldozers division. He works closely with the Caterpillar Foundation to support local organizations and his charitable and civic work with the Boys and Girls Club dates back to his Illinois Wesleyan student days.

Coon says that being a freshman starter on the 1997 NCAA championship team is his most treasured team accomplishment and lists being honored multiple times as an All- American for his playing skills and being on the first team of the d3hoops.com All- Decade squad as personally satisfying. “But being a three-time Academic All-American is the honor I’m most proud of as a student-athlete. To be honored with this elite group of student-athletes for both athletic and academic achievement is a tremendous honor.” Being named as an Academic All-American is no guarantee of a bright career future, but it’s worth noting that among IWU’s first six Academic All-Americans, four were biology or chemistry majors and became physicians – Bill Farrar ‘71 (second team football, 1970), Dean Gravlin ‘73 (first team men’s basketball, 1972 and 1973), Mike Sprague ‘74 (first team baseball, 1974), and Bob Spear ‘77 (first team men’s basketball, 1975, 1976 and 1977).

Gravlin was also the recipient of the 1972 A.O. Duer Scholarship Award of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics, presented to the most outstanding junior scholar-athlete from all sports, a predecessor to Academic All-American of the Year.

IWU’s earliest first team selection, football player Keith Ihlanfeldt ‘72, is the DeVoe Moore Eminent Scholar Professor of Economics at Florida State University.

Jack Sikma ‘77, a 2019 selection to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, was a first team Academic All-American in 1976 and 1977 and became the first Division III student-athlete to be inducted into the Academic All-America Hall of Fame in 1998. Sikma is one of only 170 people inducted into the Hall of Fame since its 1988 inception. In addition to Lyons and Coon, IWU boasts six other student-athletes who earned the top distinction of Academic All-American of the Year for their respective sports: Lon Erickson ‘97, James Rinne ‘00, Keelan Amelianovich ‘06, Meg Stanley ‘71, and Matthew Leritz ‘22.

Given the athletic successes at Illinois Wesleyan, the school’s overall total is not likely to stay at 150 for long. “Our student-athletes are meeting challenges in the classroom as well as on their respective playing fields,” said longtime baseball coach Dennis Martel. “Our Academic All-America total is something impressive not only to recruits but to current players, alumni and people from other schools.”

“The hard work and discipline needed to become an Academic All-American, without a doubt, provides a great foundation for what lies ahead for student-athletes as they enter the workforce,” said Coon. “The recognition provides motivation and confidence to the student-athletes preparing to move on after graduation.”