Parts of this story courtesy of Centenary College and Texas Lutheran University Sports Information
LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. -- The Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference had four baseball student-athletes named to the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) Academic All-District 8 First Team Thursday.
First-team Academic All-District honorees advance to the CoSIDA Academic All-America Team ballot, where First, Second and Third Team All-America honorees will be selected later this month.
Centenary College's Michael Schimpf was recognized for the second consecutive year, while Texas Lutheran University's Dylan Drgac, Riley Schaefer and Matthew Lemon received Academic All-District First Team honors for the first time.
Schimpf, who graduated from Centenary with degrees in French and history and a 3.94 GPA, currently leads the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference for the second-straight year in batting average (.412). He leads the conference and is eighth in the country with a .556 on-base percentage.
Announced last week, Schimpf repeated both as First Team All-Conference and All-Tournament. Also in 2017, he has garnered three SCAC Player of the Week and two D3Baseball.com team of the week nods.
Drgac, a starter in TLU's pitching rotation, holds a 3.51 grade point average as a Biology (Pre-Medicine) major. He joined Eric Daubach of Cornell (Iowa) as the pitchers from District 8 advancing to the national ballot.
Lemon, the Bulldogs' starting left-fielder, has a 3.89 GPA in Biology. Schaefer is a 4.0 student in Accounting.
Drgac and Lemon are natives of Caldwell, Texas and products of Caldwell High School. Schaefer is from Thorndale, Texas and Thorndale High School.
Lemon and Schaefer were named to the Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference First Team All-Conference as outfielders. Drgac was named to the SCAC Second Team All-Conference as a pitcher.
Drgac finished his 2017 season with a 6-4 record and a 2.54 ERA. An SCAC Pitcher of the Week, Drgac tossed three complete games and one shutout. He also had one save. Drgac struck out 48 and walked 15. Opponents hit just .212 against him.
Lemon hit .331 with 22 RBI, a homer, three triples and eight doubles. He scored 30 runs and walked 18 times. He stole four bases and made just one error all season.
Schaefer hit .343 and tallied 33 runs, 26 RBI and 13 stolen bases. He collected seven doubles, five triples and a home run. He also made just one error all season.
The Academic All-District teams include student-athletes from eight geographic districts across the United States and Canada. This is the sixth year of the expanded Academic All-America program as CoSIDA moved from recognizing a University Division (Division I) and a College Division (all non-Division I). This move has doubled the number of scholar-athletes honored.
The expanded teams include NCAA Division I, NCAA Division II and NCAA Division III participants, while the College Division Academic All-America Team combines NAIA, Canadian and two-year schools.
The Division II and III Academic All-America programs are being financially supported by the NCAA Division II and III national governance structures to assist CoSIDA with handling the awards fulfillment aspects for the 2016-17 DII and DIII Academic All-America teams program.
For more information about the Academic All-District and Academic All-America Teams program, please visit www.cosida.com.
Complete All-District Teams Listed Here
