February 22, 2018

Degenkolb Earns CoSIDA Academic All-District Honors

UPLAND, Ind. – Taylor University's Mason Degenkolb was named to the CoSIDA Academic All-District II College Division Team for men's basketball, as voted on and announced by the College of Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) on Thursday.

The CoSIDA Academic All-District award is designed to recognize student-athletes for outstanding achievements in the classroom, as well as on the court or field of play. In order to be eligible for the honor, an athlete must have a cumulative grade-point average of 3.30 or higher on a 4.0 scale, must have achieved sophomore status academically with at least one full year at their current institution and must have participated in over half of the team's competitions as a key contributor during the current season.

Student-athletes are nominated for the award by their institution's Sports Information Director and voted on by CoSIDA members from around the nation.

Degenkolb was one of six men's basketball student-athletes from the Crossroads League to receive the honor, joining Derek Hinen and Evan Henry of Saint Francis, Joe Schmitz and Jacob Paul of Mount Vernon Nazarene and Zach Medendorp of Spring Arbor as Academic All-District standouts. Degenkolb, Hinen and Henry claimed three of the five available spots from District II, which consists of NAIA student-athletes from Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana and Tennessee.

The scoring guard was the lone non-senior selected from District II and closed his sophomore season with 14.8 points, 3.7 rebounds, 2.7 assists and a 1.1 steals per game to rank second on the Trojans in scoring, assists and steals. Degenkolb also played a team-leading 29.4 minutes per game, started all 31 games and finished his season rated No. 3 among all NAIA Division II performers with a 90.1-percent rate from the charity stripe.

Degenkolb earned the CoSIDA Academic All-District II honor in his first year of eligibility, with a cumulative 3.79 grade-point average in exercise science at TU. Degenkolb will now advance to the national ballot for the CoSIDA Academic All-America Team, which will be announced on March 15.

Degenkolb was joined by Cassidy Wyse, Kendall Bradbury, Abby Buchs and Becca Buchs from the Taylor women's basketball program in garnering the prestigious honor. The five basketball awards give Taylor University a total of 20 CoSIDA Academic All-District honors during the 2017-2018 year from the sports of soccer, football, volleyball and basketball.