Field Hockey

Five SJC Rookies Claim GNAC All-Rookie Team Honors

Posted: Nov 10, 2021

STANDISH, Maine – For this year only, the Great Northeast Athletic Conference (GNAC) released All-Rookie Teams in addition to the league's traditional All-Conference selections and five Saint Joseph's College athletes earned the unique honor.

Field hockey underclassmen Abbie Jacques (Mount Vernon, Maine) and Cailyn Wesley (Peabody, Mass.), men's soccer first-years Gus Ford (Falmouth, Maine) and Rion Dos Santos (San Paulo, Brazil), and women's soccer freshman Alicen Burnham (Monmouth, Maine) have claimed All-Rookie Team honors for their respective sports.

Due to the unique circumstances created by the COVID-19 pandemic, fall teams essentially featured two first-year classes this season, as institutions either did not face outside competition or played a limited number of games during the 2020-21 academic year. Before the fall season began, the NCAA announced a blanket eligibility waiver, which essentially provided all student-athletes with an additional year of eligibility to account for the 'lost year' of competition.

With a much larger group of first-year athletes and just one 'Rookie of the Year' award for each sport, the conference made a unilateral decision to allow coaches to nominate, and vote for, freshmen and sophomores to be listed on sport-specific All-Rookie Teams.

#GOMONKS

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Founded in 1912 by the Sisters of Mercy in Portland, Maine, Saint Joseph’s College is Maine’s Catholic liberal arts college in the Mercy tradition. We are inclusive of all faiths, including no faith. The 474-acre campus, located on the shore of Sebago Lake in Standish, Maine offers more than 40 undergraduate programs and a Division III athletic program to a population of approximately 1,000 on-campus students. A pioneer of distance education since the 1970s, the College also provides online certificates and undergraduate and graduate degrees for thousands more working adults who reside in more than 20 other countries. In 2015 the College was selected by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching to receive its Community Engagement Classification, highlighting the College’s focus on community service throughout its mission and daily interactions within local, regional, and global communities. In 2018, Princeton Review recognized SJC as one of its “Green Colleges” for its sustainability initiatives. Learn more at www.sjcme.edu.