Several Area Players Named Academic All-State
INDIANAPOLIS – A handful of basketball players were named to the Indiana Basketball Coaches Association First-Team and Honorable Mention All-State lists.
The boys Academic All-State First Team list included two from the Northern Lakes Conference in Plymouth’s Mack Mercer and Northridge’s Nate Ritchie. Three area girls made the First Team All-Academic list in Taylor Parmley of Mishawaka, Kelsie Peterson of West Noble and Kayla Shaffer of Culver Community.
Warsaw’s Nate Pearl was included in the boys Honorable Mention Academic All-State list. Included in the honorables were Phoenix Goad of Manchester, Austen Hayes and Tyler Prentkowski of John Glenn, Eric Herber of Lakeland, Ryan Kupferschmid and Tanner Watson of Elkhart Christian Academy, Michael Sharp of East Noble, and the quartet of Penn in Matt Chaffee, Isaiah Cook, Andrew Kimm and Christian Wittendorf.
Warsaw also had an Honorable Mention Academic All-State on the girls list in Eryn Leek while Triton had Taylor Hatfield and Mallorie Jennings both listed. Concluding the girls list were the Northridge trio of Molly Bontrager, Morgan Miller and Brianne O’Dell, NorthWood’s Taylor Fielstra and Inger Yoder, Caroline Buhr of Penn, Kaitlin Elsasser of Mishawaka, Madison Cook of Easst Noble, Amanda Middleton of Argos and Erin Patterson of John Glenn.
In total, the IBCA recognized 33 boys and 36 girls in top honors as the First Teamers, while 242 boys and girls were tabbed as Honorable Mention All-State. The IBCA has issued the academic honors for boys since 1973 and girls since 1980. To meet criteria for the awards, students must possess a 3.5 GPA or higher on a 4.0 scale, a class rank in the upper 25 percent of one’s class, an SAT score of 1,500 or an ACT score of 23 or better.