The National Ten Pin Coaches Association, has named five members of the FAMU Lady Rattlers' bowling team to it's All-Academic team. Jazmin Bingham, Kiana Cogdell, Gina Davis, Lauren Mathews and Samantha Mighty, were all bestowed the honor.Coach Sheila Martin, who doubles as the FAMU athletic department's compliance coordinator for finance, pushed her team to do everything necessary to be successful in the classroom.
Proportionately, that represents 55% of the total team of nine players. All members of the bowling team maintained a 3.0 or better grade point average. In order to make the NTPCA All-Academic team, they needed to achieve a 3.4 minimum GPA. Martin's squad also won the award for having the highest team GPA in FAMU Athletics.
Martin was ecstatic to learn about her team's academic success.
"It's an honor, knowing that they accomplishing the on and off the field concept of being a student first. The academic support of having the proper advisors to put their schedules in tact and maintaining a mandatory study hall for road games was key to this accomplishment. Being diligent in making sure that they turned in all of their excuses when we returned from road trips was essential as well. Our advisor, Travis Green, was instrumental in keeping us on track and assisting as we tracked our team's progress through the semester. It required remaining focused to prevent them from getting burned out, but maintaining their level of performance on and off the court," Martin said.