Three members of the University of Missouri-Rolla swimming team have been named to the academic all-district team for the 2006-07 season, with two of the three being selected to the first team.
Bill Gaul, who was named as the ESPN The Magazine "Academic All-America of the Year" last season, repeated as a first-team selection on the all-district squad and was joined on the first team by Andy Shelley. Travis Stensby, one of the Miners' top scorers at the national meet this season, was a second-team selection.
The at-large category covers all sports that do not have a designated team in the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America program, which includes sports such as swimming, tennis and wrestling.
Gaul earned All-America honors this season as part of the Miners’ 200-yard medley relay team that finished sixth at the NCAA Division II Championships and earned 11 All-America awards in his four seasons with the Miner program. He also earned numerous academic honors, including the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America "Player of the Year" award in the at-large category in the College Division for the 2005-06 school year.
He finished among the top 16 in the nation in the two breaststroke events at the national meet in 2006 and was also part of the Miners' 200-yard medley relay team that placed sixth. He was also a 2005 selection to the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America second team. He is majoring in chemical engineering at UMR.
Shelley, a mechanical engineering major who also made the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America team in 2005 as a second-team selection, was part of the Miners’ 800-yard freestyle relay team that placed fourth at this year’s national meet. He has earned five All-America awards during his career as a Miner and was a consistent scorer for the Miners at meets throughout the last four seasons.
Last month, Gaul and Shelley were named as recipients of NCAA Post-Graduate Scholarships worth $7,500 towards graduate school work.
Stensby, who majors in mechanical engineering, finished second in the 100-yard butterfly at the national meet in March and also took third in the 100-yard backstroke. In addition, he earned All-America honors as part of both of UMR’s medley relay teams and honorable mention status in the 200-yard backstroke.
In his three seasons as a Miner after transferring from the University of Minnesota, Stensby won 13 All-America awards and set four individual school records; he is also a member of the record-setting 400-yard medley relay team. He was the recipient of the Gale Bullman Award following the 2006-07 season which is given to the top senior student-athlete in the UMR program.
In addition, he earned five finishes among the top three in his events at the New South Intercollegiate Swimming Championships which the Miners won as a team. At the NCAA Championships, the Miners finished fourth overall, the second-highest finish ever by a UMR athletic team at a national competition.
All three individuals were selected to the College Swimming Coaches Association of America’s all-academic team, where the Miners as a team have been the top-ranked team in NCAA Division II throughout that span.
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