GREENWOOD, Ind. – In addition to being a heavy hitter on the field, Southern Arkansas Football’s Brock Floyd is a heavy hitter in the classroom. On Tuesday, the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) named the Frisco, Texas native an Academic All-America First Team honoree. Floyd is the lone representative from the Great American Conference to appear on either the first or second team.

A 2021 CoSIDA Academic All-Super Region 3 honoree, Floyd becomes the third Mulerider to lay claim to Academic All-America status joining Kile Pletcher (WR) in 2017 and Jordan White (P) in 2018. Both of those former student-athletes earned second team recognition making Floyd the first Mulerider in SAU’s NCAA Era to receive first team honors.

A Business Administration: Management major with a 3.77 GPA, Floyd also received first team All-GAC honors and Don Hansen All-Super Region 3 Third Team plaudits in 2019. The Texan, who has started all 24 games in his time in Magnolia, has recorded 130 career tackles with five interceptions, two of which he returned for touchdowns. He has also forced two fumbles, recovered four fumbles and defended 11 passes.

Floyd is SAU Football’s representative for the department’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), is a member of SAU’s inaugural induction class of Chi Alpha Sigma, a member of the National Society of Leadership & Success and a member of the Mulerider Football Leadership Committee.

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SEARCY – The 2019-20 Harding men’s and women’s track and field teams received the All-Academic Team honor Thursday from the United States Track & Field and Cross-Country Coaches Association. Harding also had five women’s track and field members-Cara Mason, Cooper Monn, Darcy Sanford, Natalie Toney and Sierra White-receive individual All-Academic honors.

The All-Academic Team honor recognizes outstanding academic achievement by a team with a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or better. Harding’s men had a 3.15 team GPA, and Harding’s women had a 3.36 GPA.

Individuals receiving the All-Academic honors qualified with a 3.25 cumulative GPA and had to achieve an automatic or provisional qualifying mark during the indoor track and field season.

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SEARCY – Harding golfers Jake Croshaw and Gregor MacIntosh received Division II Srixon/Cleveland Golf All-America Scholar honor last week. They were two of 99 Division II golfers to receive the award.

To be eligible, an individual must be a sophomore, junior or senior, have a stroke average of 78.0 or lower and have a cumulative GPA or 3.20 or higher.

Croshaw, of Loughborough, England, averaged 75.1 strokes per round in 18 rounds as a sophomore. He is an accounting major with a 3.38 GPA.

MacIntosh, a native of Crawley, England, averaged 73.1 strokes in 18 rounds as a senior. He graduated in May with a 3.84 GPA, earning a Bachelor of Science degree in sport and recreation management.

MacIntosh became the fourth Harding player to earn the award twice, joining Lucas Collins (2013 and 2014), Mason Banger (2017, 2018) and Juan Luis Sanchez (2017, 2018).

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∗ Htut Zar will be joining the Little Rock soccer team as a new assistant coach, coach Adrian Blewitt announced on Thursday.

Zar will be the Trojans’ goalkeeper coach this fall and also help the staff with video editing.

“Htut brings with him great knowledge of the game having played for his national team and has earned a variety of high-level coaching licenses,” Blewitt said. “His personality and passion for the game is infectious. He’s a superb addition to our staff.”

Zar joins the Trojans after spending the last year as the assistant men’s soccer coach and head men’s tennis coach at the University of Minnesota Morris. While working with the Cougars, Zar put an emphasis on goalkeeper training and put together an interactive team-building program. He also established the program’s first summer youth camp and oversaw academic progress for his student-athletes.

∗ More than 2,000 Sun Belt Conference student-athletes were named to the 2015-16 Commissioner’s List and Academic Honor Roll as announced by the league office Tuesday afternoon with A-State accounting for 170 of the honorees.

The Commissioner’s List honors student-athletes who maintained a 3.5 grade point average or better during the 2015-16 academic year while the Academic Honor Roll honors those student-athletes who maintained a GPA between 3.0 and 3.49 for the academic year.

The Red Wolves had 91 student-athletes named to the Commissioner’s List, while 79 student-athletes were named to the Academic Honor Roll.

Conference wide, Women’s Track & Field and Cross Country had the largest number of student-athletes on the Commissioner’s List with 141 followed by Women’s Soccer which had 138. Football led all sports on the Academic Honor Roll as 262 student-athletes were named to the list. Baseball was second with 134 on the Academic Honor Roll.

Recently, the A-State men’s cross country, football, and volleyball teams were recognized by the Sun Belt Conference for winning Team GPA Awards.  The athletics department saw over 50 student-athletes graduate during the 2015-16 academic year.

The Red Wolves have seen their academic performance reach an all-time high during the last three years including a 3.070 all-department GPA in the fall of 2015, a semester which also saw a school-record 213 student-athletes named to the Athletics Director’s Honor Roll. The athletics department also posted its best ever department-wide APR (Academic Progress Rates) score each of the last two years, according to the latest data.

A-State’s women’s bowling, women’s golf, women’s tennis, and men’s cross country claimed Public Recognition Awards from the NCAA during the past year for earning multi-year APR in the top 10 percent of all teams in each sport.

• Information compiled from Little Rock and Arkansas State sports departments.

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