"Awards Show Countdown": Field Hockey

"Awards Show Countdown" is a Wells College Athletics feature that reviews a memorable moment from each team while counting down to showtime. With 10 days remaining until the virtual online Express awards show, let's take a look at a moment from the field hockey team's 2019 season.

It's not often that an off-field honor could upstage anything on the field for any collegiate sports team. But that's what the field hockey team did when they were recognized as the fourth-best team in the nation academically.

The 2019 Wells College field hockey team was recognized by the National Field Hockey Coaches Association (NFHCA) as a top-five college for academic performance in March 2020.

The Wells College field hockey team members combined for a 3.69 Grade Point Average (GPA). Just three schools in the nation had a higher team GPA than Wells that included: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (3.84), William Paterson University (3.75) and Middlebury College (3.71).

While the latter school took the 2019 NCAA D-III national championship, Wells finished its season in the title game of the North Eastern Athletic Conference.

It was the second time in the last five years that Wells achieved a top-five recognition after a national fifth-best 3.60 GPA in 2015. On a national level over the last half-decade, only two other schools were able to outperform the Express field hockey team in the classroom with more top-five academic performances - putting Wells in an elite nationwide standing in academic achievement among NCAA D-III schools.