UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Seniors Kaleigh Riehl and Stephen Nedoroscik have been selected as Penn State's 2019-20 recipients for the prestigious Big Ten Medal of Honor.
The Big Ten, the nation's oldest collegiate conference, commemorates the 106th anniversary of a very unique tradition - the Big Ten Medal of Honor. The conference's most exclusive award was the first of its kind in intercollegiate athletics to recognize academic and athletic excellence. The Big Ten Medal of Honor was first awarded in 1915 to one student from the graduating class of each university who had "attained the greatest proficiency in athletics and scholastic work."
In 1982, the award was expanded to include one female student-athlete from each member institution. Big Ten institutions feature nearly 10,000 students competing in intercollegiate athletics, but only 28 earn this prestigious award on an annual basis. In more than 100 years of the Big Ten Medal of Honor, nearly 1,400 students have earned this distinction.
Riehl is the fifth women's soccer student-athlete to win Big Ten Medal of Honor laurels, joining Emily Oleksiuk (2003), Joanna Lohman (2005), Zoe Bouchelle (2009) and Britt Eckerstrom (2016). Nedoroscik is the fifth Nittany Lion men's gymnast to earn the award, joining Joe Roemer (1998), Jerker Taudien (2005), Miguel Pineda (2012) and Adrian Evans (2014).
Ally McHugh (women's swimming) and Jason Nolf (wrestling) were Penn State's 2018-19 honorees.
Kaleigh Riehl
Riehl became the NCAA Division I all-time leader in minutes played by a position player during her senior year in 2019. Riehl was a two-time All-American, 2018 Big Ten Defender of the Year, a three-time all-region performer and a four-time All-Big Ten honoree. She also earned the 2020 McCoy Award, which I awarded by Penn State to one senior female who has combined successful athletic participation with academic excellence.
Riehl started all 101 games of her Penn State career and is one of just 11 Nittany Lions to earn multiple All-America honors in University history. During Riehl's four seasons of competition in 2015, 2017-19, Penn State won 72 games, two Big Ten regular season titles, three Big Ten Tournament titles and the 2015 NCAA National Championship. Riehl was drafted by Sky Blue FC with the 11th overall selection in the NWSL draft following her senior season.
In the classroom, Riehl finished with a 3.92 cumulative grade-point average and was named a first-team Scholar All-American in 2019 and second-team Scholar All-American in 2018 by the United Soccer Coaches. Riehl was a three-time Academic All-Big Ten Selection, twice named a Big Ten Distinguished Scholar and CoSIDA Academic All-District in 2019.
Stephen Nedoroscik
Nedoroscik was the 2020 Nissen-Emery Award winner, which is the highest honor in NCAA men's gymnastics. He solidified himself as not only the top pommel horse specialist in the country but also as one of the top in the world by winning the Melbourne World Cup with an impressive 15.4 score.
During the collegiate season, he was the National Specialist of the Year and an All-America selection after posting the nation's top pommel horse national qualifying average, overall average and routine. He scored a 15.9 at Air Force, which ranks as the nation's top score in over five years despite recent scoring changes that made that high of a score more difficult. In his three national championship meets, Nedoroscik won two national titles and was the runner-up once. He is a four-time All-American, Big Ten champion, a two-time All-Big Ten honoree and a three-year member of the U.S. National Team. He accomplished all of that despite being an unheralded recruit coming out of high school.
Academically, Stephen is a three-time Academic All-Big Ten honoree and carries a 3.33 GPA. He is set to graduate with a degree in electrical engineering in the fall of 2020. Additionally, he received the Big Ten Sportsmanship Award in 2018.
Penn State Among the Nation's Most Comprehensive and Successful Athletic Programs
Under the leadership of Vice President for Intercollegiate Athletics Sandy Barbour, Penn State has one of the nation's most comprehensive and successful athletic programs, featuring 800 student-athletes across 31 varsity programs (16 men's, 15 women's). The Nittany Lions' 31 programs are tied for the fourth-highest number of sports sponsored by a Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) institution.
Penn State student-athletes have led the athletic department to 34 Big Ten championships and nine NCAA National Championships since October 2013. The Nittany Lions have finished in the top 15 of the Learfield IMG College Director's Cup 19 times in the last 26 years (the Director's Cup was not awarded in 2019-20).
School-Record Twenty Teams Earn Perfect 1,000 APR Scores in 2018-19; Football Posts First Single-Year 1,000 APR Score
The 20 Penn State teams that earned perfect APR scores of 1,000 in 2018-19 were: women's basketball, men's cross country, women's cross country, women's fencing, field hockey, football, men's golf, women's golf, men's gymnastics, women's gymnastics, men's hockey, women's hockey, men's lacrosse, women's lacrosse, men's volleyball, softball, women's swimming & diving, women's tennis, women's track & field and women's volleyball.
The football team posted its first 1,000 single-year APR in program history, topping the previous high of 993 in 2014-15. The women's cross country, women's fencing, men's golf, women's golf and women's track & field teams have perfect 1,000 yearly APR scores in four consecutive reports.
Nittany Lions' Multi-Year APR Average Again Exceeds Division I Average
The average multi-year APR score for Penn State's 29 varsity teams is 986, above the Division I average of 983, according to the NCAA. The men's and women's indoor and outdoor track & field teams are combined in the APR data, reducing the number of Penn State teams from 31 to 29 in the compilation.
To be eligible for Academic All-Big Ten selection, students must be on a varsity team, as verified by being on the official squad list as of May 1 for spring sports, who have been enrolled fulltime at the institution for a minimum of 12 months and carry a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher.
The conference office will also present the Distinguished Scholar Award at a later date. Students eligible for the Distinguished Scholar Award must be a recipient of Academic All-Big Ten recognition in the previous academic year, must have been enrolled fulltime at the institution for the entire previous academic year (two semesters or three quarters) and earned a minimum GPA of 3.70 or better during the previous academic year (excluding any summer grades). The Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award was established by conference Faculty Representatives as an addition to the conference's Academic All-Big Ten program.
