Southland Announces 2016 Football All-Academic Team
Southland Conference
FRISCO, Texas – Stephen F. Austin senior safety Marlon Walls added another academic accolade to his 2016 season, being named Southland Conference Football Student-Athlete of the Year, the league announced Monday in conjunction with All-Academic selections.
Walls, a two-time All-Academic selection, also earned CoSIDA Academic All-American, CoSIDA Academic All-District and FCS ADA Academic All-Star honors this season. He was also a finalist for the STATS FCS Doris Robinson Award presented to the scholar-athlete of the year. The Pearland, Texas native posted a perfect 4.00 grade point average with a major in engineering physics and minor in mathematics. He started in 10 of 11 games for the Lumberjacks while ranking third on the team with 61 total tackles and leading with 36 solo stops.
Central Arkansas led the way with five selections, including wide receivers Desmond Smith and Jatavious Wilson, tight end Cody Dauksch, and offensive linemen Stockton Mallett and John Cook. Smith has now been named to the Southland All-Academic team three times.
UIW earned four spots on this year’s All-Academic team, including the quarterback spot with graduate student Trent Brittain, a two-time selection with a 3.34 GPA and major in administration.
Nicholls and Stephen F. Austin each earned three spots while Abilene Christian, Lamar, Northwestern State and Sam Houston State earned a pair of selections each.
To be an automatic selection, a student-athlete must be a first-team All-Southland Conference honoree, a Capital One CoSIDA Academic All-American/All-District selection or named to the FCS Athletic Directors Association Academic All-Star Team, which was announced this week leading up to the FCS national championship game.
The Southland Conference awards committee, which consists of one administrator from each of the 13 member universities, voted for the student-athlete of the year. The Southland student-athlete of the year award is presented to the one student-athlete who achieves excellence in both academics and athletics. All nominees shall have earned at least a 3.2 GPA on a 4.0 scale, and demonstrated athletics achievement for at least two years at the nominating institution.
The All-Academic teams are voted on by the head coaches, sports information directors and academic advisors from each Southland Conference university. Student-athletes must possess a 3.0 cumulative GPA, have completed one full academic year at the nominating institution and participated in at least 50 percent of the team’s competition to qualify for the all-academic squad.
2016 Southland Football All-Academic Teams
Student-Athlete of the Year: Marlon Walls, Jr., DB, Stephen F. Austin
Offense
| Pos. |
Name |
School |
Cl. |
GPA |
Major |
| QB |
Trent Brittain2 |
UIW |
Grad. |
3.34 |
Sports Management |
| RB |
Adrian Duncan |
Abilene Christian |
Sr. |
3.35 |
Kinesiology: Health Promotion |
| RB |
Kade Harrington3 |
Lamar |
Sr. |
3.06 |
Finance |
| WR |
Desmond Smith*3 |
Central Arkansas |
Sr. |
3.19 |
Biology |
| WR |
Jatavious Wilson* |
Central Arkansas |
Sr. |
3.33 |
Health Education |
| TE |
Cody Dauksch |
Central Arkansas |
Grad. |
3.70 |
Math |
| OL |
Stockton Mallett*2 |
Central Arkansas |
Jr. |
3.13 |
Undecided |
| OL |
Hunter Barron%2 |
Houston Baptist |
Sr. |
3.80 |
Accounting |
| OL |
Chandler Arceneaux* |
Nicholls |
Jr. |
3.13 |
Human Performance Education |
| OL |
Brian Hernandez% |
Nicholls |
Sr. |
3.77 |
Biology Pre-Med/Dentistry |
| OL |
Chris Zirkle% |
Northwestern State |
So. |
4.00 |
Business Administration |
| OL |
John Cook^ |
Central Arkansas |
Jr. |
3.87 |
Biology |
| OL |
Trevor Mason^ |
UIW |
Grad. |
4.00 |
Government |
| K |
Luc Swimberghe |
Sam Houston State |
Grad. |
3.37 |
Marketing |
Defense
| Pos. |
Name |
School |
Cl. |
GPA |
Major |
| DL |
John Franklin*2 |
Stephen F. Austin |
Jr. |
3.254 |
Kinesiology |
| DL |
Alex Jenkins |
UIW |
Sr. |
3.25 |
Computer Information Systems |
| DL |
Koby Couron |
Lamar |
Sr. |
3.67 |
Mechanical Engineering |
| DL |
Jake Grode |
McNeese |
Sr. |
3.62 |
Business Administration |
| LB |
Sam Denmark*% |
Abilene Christian |
Jr. |
3.61 |
Engineering |
| LB |
Tre’ Bennett |
Southeastern Louisiana |
Sr. |
3.075 |
General Studies |
| DB |
Marlon Walls1&%2^ |
Stephen F. Austin |
Jr. |
4.00 |
Engineering Physics |
| DB |
P.J. Giddens%2 |
Sam Houston State |
So. |
3.76 |
General Business |
| DB |
Daryl Irby3 |
UIW |
Sr. |
3.77 |
Business Administration |
| DB |
Ryan Reed |
Northwestern State |
So. |
3.87 |
Industrial Engineering |
| DB |
Ahmad Muhammed |
Stephen F. Austin |
Jr. |
3.508 |
Business |
| P |
Tyler St. Germain |
Nicholls |
Jr. |
3.67 |
Finance |
Automatic Selections:
* 2016 First Team All-Southland
& CoSIDA Academic All-American
% CoSIDA Academic All-District
^ FCS ADA Academic All-Star
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1 Student-Athlete of the Year
2 Two-time all-academic selection
3 Three-time all-academic selection
Note: FCS ADA Academic All-Stars are automatic SLC All-Academic selections, and were added in addition to the initial five offensive linemen, all of whom met other automatic selection criteria.