Anna Winter, a 2020 Upper Iowa graduate and former Peacock volleyball player, is now one of 161 female college athletes still being considered for the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year Award.
From a program-record pool of 605 school nominees, 161 college athletes have been named conference-level nominees for the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year Award. The Northern Sun Conference nominated Winter along with Madison Paige of Minnesota State University Moorhead.
The nominees represent student-athletes from 21 different sports spanning all three NCAA divisions. Of those nominated, 59 nominees competed in Division I, 39 in Division II and 63 in Division III.
The NCAA Woman of the Year program is rooted in Title IX and has recognized graduating female college athletes for excellence in academics, athletics, community service and leadership since its inception in 1991.
Winter, a native of Rochester, Minnesota, earned Upper Iowa's first AVCA All-American recognition in 2019. She became the first Peacock to garner All-Central Region honors and was named All-NSIC First Team and to the NSIC All-Tournament Team. She earned the NSIC Elite 18 Award for volleyball and was a Myles Brand All-Academic with Distinction Award winner. This past season, she finished first on the team, second in the conference and seventh in all of NCAA Division II with 4.30 kills per set and posted a .309 hitting percentage with just 84 errors in 1245 attempts. In 2019, Winter tallied 469 kills, 506.5 points, 124 digs, 41 total blocks (3 solo), 15 aces, and five assists setting the individual season program records for kills, kills per set, attack attempts, and points and became the fifth Peacock to reach 1,000 career kills on Sept. 14. In her career, Winter collected 1,349 kills, and only 283 errors in 4,086 attempts an d added 447 digs and 148 blocks. She was also named the 2018-19 Willis R. Kelly Scholar-Athlete Award for being the NSIC's top female student-athlete as a junior.
Winter completed her undergraduate work at Upper Iowa as a triple major in mathematics, chemistry and biology with a 4.00 grade point average. Winter earned a place on the Athletics Director's Honor Roll every semester and is a three-time NSIC All-Academic Team member. She has received multiple scholarships including the G.C. Baker Scholarship the Excellence in Mathematics Scholarship, the Excellence in Mathematics Scholarship and the Goebel Scholarship. The Baker, Goebel, and Excellence in Mathematics Scholarships are given to one recipient per year and are chosen by the science and mathematics faculty, who select the top student academically for each award. Winter is an active participant on campus and in the community. She is a member of ENACTUS (campus student entrepreneurial group), a mentor for freshmen student-athletes through the Athlete Peer Educator Program, and a tutor in mathematics, biology, and chemistry. During the summer of 2019, Winter was accepted into the NASA Summer Training Program, a highly competitive program which accepts about 20 students nationally each year.
Conferences can recognize two nominees if at least one is a woman of color or international student-athlete. All nominees who compete in a sport not sponsored by their school's primary conference, as well as associate conference nominees and independent nominees, were placed in a separate pool to be considered by a selection committee. Four nominees from the pool were selected to move forward in the process with the conference nominees.
The Woman of the Year Selection Committee, made up of representatives from the NCAA membership, will now choose the Top 30 honorees — 10 from each division — from the conference-level nominees. The Top 30 honorees will be announced in September. From there, the selection committee will narrow the pool to three finalists from each division. The NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics will select the 2020 Woman of the Year from the nine finalists.
The Top 30 honorees will be celebrated and the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year will be named this fall.
