May 14, 2015 Lizzie Mikes, Media Services Coordinator –

NOTRE DAME, Ind. — Five University of Notre Dame student-athletes — junior Lee Kiefer (women’s fencing) and seniors Peter Schneider (hockey), Emma Reaney (women’s swimming), Anna Kottkamp (rowing) and Ashley Armstrong (women’s golf) — have earned Capital One Academic All-District V At-Large First team honors, the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) announced recently.

To be eligible for Academic All-America® consideration, a student-athlete must be a varsity starter or key reserve, maintain a cumulative G.P.A. of 3.30 on a scale of 4.00, have reached sophomore athletic and academic standings at his/her current institution and be nominated by his/her sports information director. Sports in the at-large program consist of women’s bowling, men’s and women’s fencing, women’s field hockey, men’s and women’s golf, men’s and women’s gymnastics, men’s and women’s ice hockey, men’s and women’s lacrosse, men’s and women’s rifle, women’s rowing, men’s and women’s skiing, men’s and women’s swimming, men’s and women’s tennis, men’s volleyball, men’s and women’s water polo and men’s wrestling.

All five athletes, in addition to their fellow first team honorees, now advance to the Capital One Academic All-America ® team ballot. Three national teams All-America honorees will be selected later this month. Armstrong, Reaney and Schneider all earned Academic All-District V honors in 2013-14, with Armstrong and Reaney moving on to earn Academic All-America accolades alongside former men’s fencer Gerek Meinhardt.

For Armstrong (Flossmoor, Illinois), this year’s District V recognition stands as the third consecutive year she has been honored as such. She is a two-time Academic All-American (the 42nd Fighting Irish athlete to cop two-time honors), and the first-ever Academic All-American in Fighting Irish women’s golf.

Armstrong completed her Notre Dame career with a 74.98 stroke average, the third-lowest all-time mark in the program’s 27-year history. She carded a career-low 74.10 season stroke average (fourth in the school’s record book) in 2014-15 and posted four top-10 finishes while tying for team-high honors with seven rounds under par, including a team-best four rounds in the 60s. In addition, the two-time Irish captain received an ACC Postgraduate Scholarship and Notre Dame’s Byron V. Kanaley Award (the University’s most prestigious honor awarded to a graduating student-athlete) in 2015, the first women’s golfer to receive the ACC scholarship and the second Kanaley award winner in program history. She was named to the ACC All-Academic Team and the Women’s Golf Coaches Association Scholar All-America Team as a junior. She will graduate this weekend with a degree in mechanical engineering from the College of Engineering boasting a 3.90 grade-point average.

A three-time medalist during her career, Armstrong won the BIG EAST Championship as a freshman in 2012 and then was victorious in back-to-back tournaments during the spring of her sophomore year in 2013 with wins at the Insperity Lady Jaguar Intercollegiate and the Briar’s Creek Invitational. She was recognized in spring of 2013 as Golfweek’s Women’s National Player of the Week (March 25-31) and the BIG EAST Women’s Golf Player of the Week (March 17-23). In addition, Armstrong was selected to the All-BIG EAST Team for the second straight season after finishing fifth at the conference tournament. Armstrong led her team to the ’13 BIG EAST crown, following a runner-up finish in ’12. In each of her four seasons at Notre Dame, she and her Irish teammates earned a berth into the NCAA regional, hosting the event in 2015 at the Warren Golf Course.

Kottkamp (Wenatchee, Washington), who was recently named Valedictorian of the class of 2015 after earning a perfect 4.00 grade-point average, also earned the Byron V. Kanaley Award and received the Top Gun Award (highest grade-point average amongst graduating senior student-athletes) at the University’s O.S.C.A.R.S. (Outstanding Students Celebrating Achievement and Recognition Showcase) ceremony last month. She stands as merely the third rower to receive the Kanaley Award, and first in program history to win the Top Gun Award.

The winner of the NCAA Elite 89 Award in 2014, she has rowed exclusively with Notre Dame’s varsity eight boat each of the past three seasons and has been a member of teams that have participated in the NCAA Championship three times. A year ago, she helped her squad to a ninth-place finish (matching a program-best) at the NCAA Championship. As a junior, Kottkamp earned Atlantic Coast Conference Scholar-Athlete of the Year honors and was tabbed as a National Scholar-Athlete by the Collegiate Rowing Coaches Association for the second consecutive year. She guided the Irish to two BIG EAST team titles in 2012 and 2013 and rowed on crews that won two gold medals.

A member of the Glynn Family Honors Program, Kottkamp is a member of the Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society, volunteers extensively in the community and participates with Notre Dame’s Voices of Faith Gospel Choir. Three years ago, she traveled to Honduras to participate in a Global Health Seminar. She graduates this weekend from the College of Science with a degree in environmental sciences and international studies.

Reaney (Lawrence, Kansas) enjoyed one of the finest careers in recent memory for any Notre Dame student-athlete, and stands as the most decorated swimmer or diver in the history of the Fighting Irish swimming and diving programs. An American record holder in the 200-yard breaststroke and the 4x50m medley relay, she became the first Fighting Irish swimmer to win a national title, claiming first in the 200-yard breaststroke and setting the American record (2:04.06). An eight-time All-American (three of which came in 2015) and five-time honorable mention honoree, she is currently in her second year as a member of the United States National Team.

Reaney was one of the top honorees at the 2015 O.S.C.A.R.S. gala, honored with the Byron V. Kanaley Award and the Francis Patrick O’Connor Award (awarded to student-athletes who best display the total embodiment of the true spirit of Notre Dame, as exemplified by their contribution to their team). She was one of 27 Irish student-athletes named to winter Olympic sports ACC All-Academic teams in 2015, and one of three women’s swimmers named to their sport’s All-Academic team. Named the ACC Swimmer of the Year and the ACC Women’s Swimming & Diving Scholar-Athlete of the Year in 2014, Reaney won 14 conference titles (10 BIG EAST, four ACC) during her career and earned all-conference honors on 18 occasions. She graduates this weekend from the College of Arts and Letters holding a 3.65 grade-point average with a degree in design and a concentration in visual communications.

Schneider (Vienna, Austria) was one of five honorees to receive the Byron V. Kanaley Award in 2015 and earned the team’s Rockne Student-Athlete Award for the third time in his career, becoming the fourth three-time winner in program history. A nominee for the Senior CLASS Award, Schneider has made all-academic teams for both Hockey East and the CCHA in his time with the Irish. He skated in 41 of Notre Dame’s 42 games in the 2014-15 season, scoring seven times with nine assists totaling 16 points. An alternate captain, he was at his best in the 2015 Hockey East playoffs, notching eight of his 16 points during the postseason. He tallied a career-high three assists in Notre Dame’s March 8 win over Massachusetts in the decisive Game 3 of a grueling first round series which featured the longest game in college hockey history. Providing needed depth in Notre Dame’s offensive lineup, the Irish were 7-2-2 in the 11 games where Schneider recorded at least one point, including each of the team’s three postseason victories. He played in 138 career games, scored 22 goals and dished off 25 assists (47 points). He graduates this weekend with a 3.91 grade-point average as a double major, with degrees in economics and finance and a minor in actuary from the Mendoza College of Business. He also participated in the Rosenthal Leadership Academy, a program sponsored by the Student Welfare and Development Office within the University’s Athletic Department.

Kiefer (Versailles, Kentucky) had a phenomenal season with the Irish in 2015, posting a 50-8 season record at NCAA events (117-18 career) while also competing internationally. She won her third consecutive individual NCAA women’s foil title and was crowned ACC Women’s Foil Champion at the first-ever ACC Women’s Fencing Championships. She also helped her team clinch the ACC Women’s team title in addition to being named ACC Women’s Team MVP, ACC Women’s Foilist of the Year, and ACC Scholar-Athlete of the Year (women’s fencing), not to mention being tabbed ACC Women’s Fencer of the Week on Feb. 4th.

She is enrolled in the College of Science as a Science Pre-Professional major with a 3.61 grade-point average, and intends to take the 2015-16 academic year off in order to train for the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. A 2012 Olympian, she currently ranks first in the U.S. and third internationally in women’s foil and routinely travels throughout the year to compete with the fifth-ranked USA senior women’s foil team.

About The Capital One Academic All-America Program

Capital One has been the entitlement rights holder to CoSIDA’s Academic All-America teams programs since 2011.

The Academic All-District ® teams are divided into eight geographic districts across the United States and Canada. This is the third year of the expanded Academic All-America® program as CoSIDA moved from recognizing a University Division (Division I) and a College Division (all non Division I) and has doubled the number of scholar-athletes honored. The expanded teams include NCAA Division I, NCAA Division II and NCAA Division III participants, while the College Division team combines NAIA, Canadian and two-year schools.

The Capital One Division II and III Academic All-America® program is being financially supported by the NCAA Division II and III national governance structures, to assist CoSIDA with handling the awards fulfillment aspects for the 2014-15 DII and DIII Academic All-America® teams program.