GIBSONIA, Pa. - Frostburg State University junior forward
Lauren Russell (Waldorf, Md./Westlake) became the seventh player in the program's history to win the Allegheny Mountain Collegiate Conference Player of the Year award on Tuesday. FSU freshman
Amanda Wharton (Mt. Airy, Md./South Carroll) is the fourth Bobcat to win the AMCC Newcomer of the Year honor as the conference released the All-AMCC teams. The 2009 league champions placed six on the all-conference teams with four players on the first team and one each on the second and honorable mentions teams.
Russell, a two-time All-AMCC First Team selection and 2007 league Newcomer of the Year, leads the team in several offensive categories with 27 goals, 16 assists and 70 points. She ranks fourth in the country in points per game (3.32), eighth in assists per game (0.79) and 15th in goals per game (1.26). The Bobcats have had a player selected as the league's player of the year in six of the last seven seasons.
Wharton has turned in one of the finest performances for a freshman in school history. She has 24 goals, nine assists and 57 points and is ranked 17th in NCAA Division III in both points per game (2.79) and goals per game (1.21). She leads the team with eight game-winning goals on the year.
Russell and Wharton join Bobcat senior
Lauren Lentine (Princeton, N.J./WWP North) and junior
Heather Fleishell (Middletown, Md./Middletown) on the all-conference first team.
Lentine, the 2008 AMCC Player of the Year and 2009 Preseason Player of the Year, earned her third first-team selection and fourth all-conference honor as a Bobcat. She has started all 21 games and is the leader of a Bobcat midfield that helped set the school record for goals in a season (90). She is tied for second in assists (9), fourth in points (19) and fifth in goals (5).
Fleishell earns all-conference first team honors for the second-straight year. The junior defender has started all 21 games this season and is the anchor on a Bobcat defense that has allowed just 12 goals with 15 shutouts. FSU is ranked 10th in the nation is shutout percentage (0.737) and 26th in goals against average (0.526).
Freshman
Liz Seligman (Rockville, Md./St. Johns College) was named to the All-AMCC second team while junior
Kierstin Stevenson (Frostburg, Md./Beall) earned honorable mention honors.
Seligman made a huge impact to the Bobcat lineup in her first season. She scored one goal but handed out six assists, including four in FSU's AMCC Tournament first round win over Pitt-Bradford. Stevenson earned all-conference honors for the first time in her career after finishing fifth on the team in both points (16) and goals (6).
The six All-AMCC selections is the lowest for the Bobcats, the six-time defending AMCC champions, since 2005. FSU has 88 All-AMCC honorees in 13 seasons.
Frostburg State faces Otterbein on Saturday, Nov. 14 at 11:00 am in the first round of the 2009 NCAA Tournament. This is the sixth trip to the NCAA Tournament and ninth-straight trip to the post season for the Bobcats since 2000.