Dec. 20, 2005
University of Portland senior forward Christine Sinclair is one of the eight outstanding student-athletes selected by the NCAA Honors Committee for their athletics success, academic achievement and community service as recipients of the NCAA Today's Top VIII Award.
The awards will be presented at the NCAA Honors Celebration on Saturday, January 7, during the annual NCAA Convention in Indianapolis, Ind. The Convention will serve as the kick-off to the NCAA's Centennial with the theme, "Celebrating the Student-Athlete."
Sinclair, a senior striker from Burnaby, B.C., was the leading goal scorer in the country this season and set a new NCAA single-season record with 39 goals. She led the Pilots to the national championship and an undefeated season, earning Most Valuable Player honors at the 2005 Women's College Cup. She also played an integral part in UP's 2002 National Championship team. Sinclair was named the West Coast Conference Player of the Year for the third consecutive season.
She received the 2004 M.A.C. Hermann Trophy and could join Mia Hamm and Cindy Parlow as the only women to receive the award in consecutive years. A member of the Canadian national team since 2000, she is the second-highest scorer in Canadian women's soccer history. She was the 2002 Honda Award winner for women's soccer and was named one of 24 finalists for the 2005 FIFA World Player of the Year.
A life science major, Sinclair was a member of the dean's list every term while at Portland. She is a three-time West Coast Conference Commissioner's Honor Roll selection and a three-time member of the WCC All-Academic Team.
Sinclair regularly serves as a volunteer at the Doernbecher Children's Hospital and the Ronald McDonald House, and she helped organize a soccer clinic for Portland's 2004 National Student-Athlete Day.
Along with Sinclair, the 2006 Today's Top VIII are Samantha Arsenault, University of Georgia, swimming and diving; Sarah Dance, Truman State University, swimming and diving; Carter Hamill, Amherst College, outdoor track and field, indoor track and field, and cross country; Nicholas Hartigan, Brown University, football; DeMeco Ryans, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, football; Richelle Simpson, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, gymnastics; and Jamie Southern, California State University, Fresno, softball.
The Honors Committee is composed of eight athletics administrators at member institutions and nationally distinguished citizens who are former student-athletes. The committee members are Cedric W. Dempsey, president emeritus of the NCAA; Susan Hartmann, professor of history at Ohio State University; Calvin Hill, a consultant to the NFL's Dallas Cowboys; Gibbs Knotts, faculty athletics representative at Western Carolina University; Valerie A. Richardson, associate athletics director for intercollegiate sports programs and senior woman administrator at Columbia University; Julie Power Ruppert, associate commissioner and senior woman administrator at the America East Conference; Thomas J. Brown, commissioner of the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference; and Timothy W. Gleason, commissioner of the Ohio Athletic Conference.