AUSTIN, Texas – Postseason awards for Great Midwest Athletic Conference softball student-athletes continued to roll in with the announcement of the Google Cloud Academic All-America Team presented by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA).
The Division II Google Cloud Academic All-America program is partially financially supported by the NCAA Division II national governance structure, to assist CoSIDA with handling the awards fulfillment aspects for the 2018-19 Division II Academic All-America teams.
Eighteen of the 33 members of the 2019 Google Cloud Academic All-America Division II Softball teams have at least a 3.90 GPA, with 11 student-athletes maintaining a perfect 4.00 GPA. The 11 members of the first team have an average GPA of 3.90.
Earning a spot on the second team was Trevecca Nazarene’s shortstop MaKray Odom and securing a selection on the third team was Kentucky Wesleyan senior outfielder Meredith Daunhauer.
Since joining their respective programs, Odom and Daunhauer have proven themselves to be two of the best in conference history in many different statistical categories.
Their outstanding work in the classroom complements their athletic successes. Both Odom and Daunhauer have been All-Americans and have been familiar faces as first team all-conference picks by the coaches.
Odom was one of seven infielders named on the second team. She has a 3.49 GPA while majoring in education. Daunhauer, who graduated this spring while helping the Panthers deep into the conference tournament, finished her career with a 3.88 GPA in elementary education.
This season, Daunhauer collected 78 hits in 168 at bats. Her .464 batting average ranked second in the Great Midwest and 14th nationally. Her hit total also ranked second in the conference standings while 78 hits sits 12th in the country.
The Evansville, Ind., prep product was a four-time all-conference selection and was the league’s freshman of the year. She earned all-region honors four times and was placed on the Google Cloud All-Academic Team twice.
Odom was a top-10 finalist for the 2019 Schutt Sports / NFCA Player of the Year after hitting a school and Great Midwest record .565 for the spring season with 59 runs, 100 hits, nine doubles, two triples, two home runs, 23 RBI, 10 walks and 50 stolen bases.
Odom, the back-to-back (2018 & 2019) Great Midwest Player of the Year, was one of 50 on the preseason Schutt Sports / NFCA Player of the Year Watch List and one of 12 off the watch list to make the final 25.
The junior made three all-American teams this year: the NFCA All-American First Team, the D2CCA All-American Second Team and the Google Cloud CoSIDA Academic All-American Second Team.