HUDSONVILLE, Mich. -- On Monday, August 7, the Michigan Intercollegiate Athletic Association (MIAA) announced the 110 teams that earned the MIAA Team GPA Award for the 2022-23 academic year.
The MIAA Team GPA Award is presented to conference athletic teams that achieve a 3.300 or better GPA for an academic year. Grade-point averages are calculated at the end of the academic year.
All eight of Saint Mary's College's MIAA-sponsored sports eclipsed the standard for the Team GPA Award. In addition, all of the MIAA-sponsored women's programs from Albion College, Alma College, Calvin University, Hope College, and Trine University received the Team GPA Award.
This is the fifth-consecutive year that at least three different conference-sponsored sports had 100 percent of teams achieve the accolade's academic standard: women's basketball, women's soccer, women's swimming and diving, and volleyball. Additionally, seven MIAA member institutions - Albion, Alma, Calvin, Hope, Kalamazoo College, Saint Mary's and Trine - had fifty percent or better of their MIAA-sponsored athletic teams that were named Team GPA honorees.
Six athletic departments had double figures of teams honored, with Trine University leading the way at sixteen honorees. Alma, Calvin, and Hope were all second with fifteen teams each. Albion and Kalamazoo tied-for-fifth with fourteen teams earning the Team GPA Award. Saint Mary's is represented by eight teams on the academic list, followed by The University of Olivet with seven, and Adrian College with six programs.
Of the 110 programs honored, twenty-four boasted a 3.600 team GPA or above for the 2022-23 academic year, with five reaching the 3.800 plateau. The programs surpassing 3.800 in 2022-23 were Trine's women's (3.93) and men's (3.89) tennis teams, Trine's women's cross country squad (3.83), Saint Mary's golf team (3.81), and Trine's women's golf program (3.80).
Ten of the eighteen teams (including one co-champion) that won an MIAA Regular-Season Championship title also earned Team GPA Award honors. Fourteen-of-twenty one MIAA Championship/Tournament champions were Team GPA Award honorees. Twenty-two of the league's twenty-three sponsored sports had at least one team named a Team GPA honoree.
The MIAA has presented the Team GPA Award each year since the 1998-99 academic year. To note, both Calvin’s women’s cross country and Hope women’s cross country are the only programs to earn the Team GPA Award twenty-five consecutive academic years.
