Gauchos celebrate academic success

With graduation right around the corner it was time for the annual student-athlete academic luncheon on Monday in the Saddleback Gymnasium.  The Saddleback athletics department recognized academic success along with a few annual awards.

Saddleback has a long history of tremendous success in the classroom and the 2018-19 calendar year was another example of Gaucho athletics being a leader at preparing its student-athletes for a four-year experience.  Saddleback had 159 of its 301 athletes achieve a 3.0 GPA or higher during the fall semester (52.8%), with 34 having a perfect 4.0 GPA.  Additionally, seven different teams achieved a cumulative GPA of 3.0-or-higher, with women's volleyball, women's golf and women's water polo all above 3.4. 

Saddleback also named both a female and male scholar athlete-of-the-year at the event on Monday, with Samantha Chasteler (track & field) winning the Female Scholar Athlete-of-the-Year and Arash Poorsina (basketball) being recognized as the Male Scholar Athlete-of-the-Year.

Saddleback athletics also handed out both the Tom Padberg Memorial Scholarship Award and Fair Play Character Champion Award to athletes that displayed high character both on and off the field of play.  This winners of the Tom Padberg Award for 2018-19 were Shawn Stith (men's basketball) and Rebecca Zachary (women's soccer).  The Fair Play Character Champion Award was given to Leo Tamba (football) and Nina Ferreira (women's soccer).

Congrats to all of our scholar-athletes and award-winners!