Janine Kuwahara wins NCAA Eilte 90 award
4/13/2016 8:39:00 PM | Women's Bowling
EAST BRUNSWICK, N.J. -- At the championship dinner and awards presentation the night before the start of the NCAA Bowling Championships, Janine Kuwahara was awarded the Elite 90 Award.
The Elite 90 is the award given to the top academic student athlete at every NCAA Championship event.
An accounting major, Janine Kuwahara has compiled a perfect 4.0 grade point average during her five semesters at Sam Houston. She has been a President's List (4.0 semester GPA) and Dean's List student (3.0+ student) each of her semesters at the university
In 2015, she received the Sam Houston Women's Letterwinners Association SH Award as the university's outstanding female student-athlete. The award recognizes achievement both in competition and in the classroom.
She also was voted to College Sports Information Directors Association (CoSIDA) Academic All-District. The honor recognized the top 25 student-athletes in a eight state region (Arkansas, Illinois, Minnesota, Nebraska, Ohio, Oklahoma and Texas) from the following NCAA Division I sports: bowling, crew, fencing, field hockey, golf, gymnastics, ice hockey, lacrosse, rifle, skiing, swimming and diving, tennis and water polo.
As the bowling team representative for the Sam Houston Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, Kuwahara is involved with numerous community service efforts including the Ronald McDonalds Houston Pop Tab drive, student-athlete visits to area elementary schools and the Huntsville Boys and Girls Club and the Enterprise Holdings Job Skills presentation for student-athletes.
The junior bowler was featured in an NCAA Champions Magazine cover story last April. The feature highlighted her journey from her home in the Philippines to Huntsville, Texas.
Kuwahara also has produced an outstanding record as an intercollegiate women's bowling competitor. As a freshman in 2014, she was a member of the Sam Houston's national championship team. The Bearkats defeated defending titlist Nebraska 4-2 in the finals on ESPN to bring home the university's first NCAA Division I National Championship trophy.
As a sophomore, Kuwahara was one of 25 women's bowlers voted as National Tenpin Coaches Association (NTCA) All-Americans after she led the Bearkats with a 201.6 average in traditional team play during the 2014-15 season.
Kuwahara again leads the team as a junior in 2015-16 with a 204.3 average. She has been selected all-tournament twice this year.
Following graduation from Sam Houston Kuwahara plans to do graduate work in accounting at a university in the United States. Her career goal is to become a certified public accountant.
Kuwahara is just the second SHSU student athlete to win the Elite academic award by the NCAA. Quarterback Greg Sprowls was the recipient in 2012 at the FCS National Championship game in Frisco.
