June 1 , 2005

Matt Silver earned ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District honors. (Photo by Ken DeBolt)

GENEVA, N.Y.—Hobart sophomore tennis player Matt Silver (Weston/Weston, Conn.) recently was named to the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District I College Division Men’s At-Large Second-Team as selected by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA). The biology major is the fourth Hobart student-athlete named to the ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District teams this year.

Manning the No. 2 singles and No. 1 doubles spots, Silver compiled a 12-8 singles mark and an 8-10 record in doubles. He finished the season with five straight singles wins and four consecutive doubles victories. Silver, who earned All-Liberty League singles honors last season, grabbed All-Liberty League doubles praise this season, after compiling an 8-5 mark during the spring. He sports a 29-13 career singles record.

A shining star in the classroom as well, Silver was a 2004-05 Liberty League All-Academic selection, and a 2004 ITA Scholar-Athlete. He received the Phi Beta Kappa Book Award for posting the highest grade point average in the Class of 2007.

To earn a place on the Academic All-America® teams, a student-athlete must maintain a minimum 3.2 grade point average, be a starter or significant reserve, and be at least a sophomore in academic standing. CoSIDA selects eight Academic All-District teams and chooses the Academic All-America teams from the eight District first-teams.

A banner year for the Statesmen, Hobart produced three Academic All-Americans this year, football seniors Chris Purtell (Pioneer/Sardinia, N.Y.) and Josh Van Auken (Greece Olympia/Rochester, N.Y.) and soccer senior Ricky Klotz (Homer/Cortland, N.Y.). Hobart had produced only five Academic All-American’s since the program began in 1952: Shawn Fazio ’81, baseball in 1979; Derek Dominici ’87, basketball in 1986; Shawn Trell ’89, at-large (lacrosse) in 1989; Erik Schiller ’98, football in 1997; and Craig Swanson ’04, football in 2003.

CoSIDA selects Academic All-America teams in 12 programs: football, women’s volleyball, men’s soccer, women’s soccer, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, baseball, softball, men’s track & field/cross country, women’s track & field/cross country, men’s at-large and women’s at-large. A first-team, second-team and third-team are selected in both the University (Division I and I-AA) and College (Division II, III and NAIA) Divisions.