STANDISH, ME – Saint Joseph's senior goalkeeper Meaghan Johnson (Portland, Maine/Cheverus) has earned 2011 Longstreth/National Field Hockey Coaches Association (NFHCA) Third Team All-America honors.
Johnson is the first SJC field hockey player in the 17-year history of the program to collect All-America accolades and the 38th St. Joe's athlete to receive the high honor. Upon further research, Johnson was found to be the only North Atlantic Conference (NAC) field hockey player to be selected as an All-America honoree over the past eight years. NFHCA All-America listings prior to the 2004 season were unavailable at the time of release.
Johnson closed out her collegiate career with her finest season and the postseason accolades have quickly accumulated as a result. Earlier this fall she collected First Team All-NAC honors – for the second consecutive season - and was chosen as the NAC Defensive Player of the Year. Last week she became the second SJC player to garner NFHCA New England First Team mention and on Saturday she participated in the 2011 NFHCA Senior game at Nichols College.
The two-year team captain started all 19 games and logged all 1393 of the Monks' minutes between the pipes this season. Johnson capped her senior campaign ranked second in the nation with a .882 save percentage while her 0.95 goals against average was the ninth-lowest in all of DIII Field Hockey. She posted a 13-6 record with six shutouts and 19 goals allowed and 142 saves this fall.
She is the program's all-time leader in goalkeeper games (74), minutes (5166), goals against average (1.23), wins (52) and shutouts (17). Johnson also owns the single-season bests for games (19, twice), minutes (1393, 2011), wins (13, four times), shutouts (6, 2011), goals against average (0.95, 2011) and save percentage (.882, 2011).
Johnson has started 74 of the Monks' 77 games over the last four seasons and her play has helped Saint Joseph's lead the NAC in goals against average all four years.
The Monks' netminder is one of four New England East Region players – joining MIT standouts Molly Duffy and Kami Clauber and Clark University's Mel Melkonian – to collect NFHCA All-America accolades this season. Eight players from Maine institutions collected honors, including five from perennial powerhouse Bowdoin College and two from University of New England.
Saint Joseph's went 13-6 overall and 8-1 in NAC play this season under the guidance of seventh-year Head Coach Rupert Lewis. The second-seeded Monks advanced to the conference championship game for the third time in four years as a NAC member, but suffered a 2-1 penalty-stroke loss at the hands of #5 Husson University in the title match on Saturday, November 5th.
ABOUT THE NFHCA:
The National Field Hockey Coaches Association (NFHCA) is a non-profit organization serving field hockey coaches and supporters of the game from across the United States. The mission of the organization is to stimulate the professional development of coaching leadership within the sport of field hockey. The NFHCA strives to cultivate and recognize the professional contributions of its membership and to foster and promote the growth of the sport. The NFHCA is responsible for providing a recognizable presence and voice in regard to legislation affecting the sport as well as interscholastic and intercollegiate programs.
