West Liberty and Ridgewood grad Audrey Tingle nominated for NCAA Woman of the Year
West Liberty University's and former Ridgewood High School standout Audrey Tingle has been selected as the nominee from the Mountain East Conference for the 2022 NCAA Woman of the Year award, announced Monday by the NCAA.
The women's basketball standout wrote herself in both the school and national record books during her playing career at West Liberty. A first-team All-Mountain East Conference and All-Atlantic Region selection, Tingle also earned an honorable mention spot on the WBCA Coaches' All-America Team after setting an NCAA Division II season record with six triple-doubles. Her 7 career triple-doubles is tied for the most in NCAA Division II history.
"We couldn't be more excited as a staff for Audrey to receive this recognition and nomination," Coach Kyle Cooper said. "Not just because it's one of the highest honors she could achieve but because we've had a front row seat to her journey, she's truly earned it and she's just flat out special. Audrey is everything that's right with our industry and is a true representation of what it means to be a student-athlete that does things the right way and our program and institution is beyond lucky to have her a part of it."
In the classroom, the West Lafayette native maintained a perfect 4.00 grade-point average while pursuing her MBA last season after completing her undergraduate degree, also with a perfect 4.00 GPA, in Speech Pathology and Audiology. She is currently finishing her MBA and is set to begin work on her master's in Speech Pathology and Audiology this fall when she returns to the hilltop as a student assistant coach.
Tingle was named the NCAA Division II Academic All-American of the Year for women's basketball as well as the MEC Female Scholar-Athlete of the Year in 2022. She is the second WLU female student-athlete ever to earn a conference nomination for the NCAA Woman of the Year award, joining Victoria Hansen, who earned the recognition in 2011.
Established in 1991, the award recognizes female student-athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves in their community, in athletics and in academics throughout their college careers.
NCAA member schools nominated 577 women for this year's edition of the national award. Conference offices then reviewed all nominees from their member schools. Nationally, conference offices submitted 151 nominees for NCAA Woman of the Year with 39 coming from Division II level. The average GPA of this year's nominee pool is 3.8.
Next, conference-level nominations will be forwarded to the NCAA Woman of the Year Selection Committee, which will choose the top 10 honorees in each of the three NCAA divisions. The NCAA will announce the Top 30 honorees in October.
From those 30 candidates, the selection committee determines the top three finalists in each division. The NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics will select the Woman of the Year from the nine finalists. The 2022 NCAA Woman of the Year will be announced during an award ceremony at the NCAA Convention in January.
INFOMATION SUPPLIED BY WEST LIBERTY UNIVERSITY
This article originally appeared on The Times-Reporter: Ridgewood graduate Audrey Tingle nominated for NCAA Woman of the Year
