BURNSVILLE, Minn. – Augustana's Kendall Cornick has been named the 2021 Willis R. Kelly Scholar-Athlete of the Year recipient awarded by the Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference (NSIC). The Kelly Scholar-Athlete Award, in its 36^th year, is presented to the NSIC's top female student-athlete.
 
Cornick, a native of Mason City, Iowa, is the first female student-athlete at Augustana to receive the conference's prestigious honor. Along with awarding the Female and Male NSIC Student-Athletes of the Year, the conference office also named Honor Student-Athlete Award Winners which included Augustana men's basketball player Tyler Riemersma.
 
"Kendall is an exemplary student-athlete," Augustana Faculty Athletic Representative Dr. Marcia Entwistle said. "Not only does she excel academically, she was a top contributor on the Augustana softball team that won the 2019 NCAA Division II National Championship.
 
"Following her exceptional career at Augustana, she will begin medical school at the University of Iowa. We could not be prouder of the fine scholar-athlete she is today and we look forward to watching her make an impact as a physician in the coming years."
 
The senior softball student-athlete is majoring in biology and psychology and holds a 3.94 GPA. A 2020 CoSIDA Academic All-America selection, Cornick is a 2019 NCAA Division II National Champion on the diamond. In the shortened 2020 season, she simply hit for a .365 average while scoring 18 runs while tallying 23 hits in 19 games.
 
"Kendall is the quintessential NCAA student-athlete at any level," Augustana softball head coach Gretta Melsted said. "She embodies all the positive qualities that collegiate sports represent. She is a fierce competitor, a relentless worker, a humble and caring teammate, a team leader, and an incredibly talented athlete and softball player."
 
In 2021, Cornick is second in the NSIC in hits (48) and doubles (13), third in runs scored (37) and is the conference leader in stolen bases at a perfect 24-for-24. She is the conferences' top hitter with a .466 average.
 
Cornick has also been active in the community and presented during the National Alliance on Mental Illness, sharing with students, teachers and parents an interactive and informative presentation concerning mental health challenges. She was the director of community outreach for Augustana's kidney disease screening and awareness program as she helped reach out to underserved and underinsured populations in the Sioux Falls community to plan free kidney health screenings.
 
In addition, she worked with Pediatric Companion at Sanford Health to assist the nurses and Child Life Specialists with their care of the pediatric patients and preparation for special events.
 
Additionally, Cornick has been a member of the Dean's List every semester at Augustana.
 
Her research experience includes being a student research assistant in the Cognitive Psychology Lab at AU, investigating the effect of technology on creativity. She has presented virtually at the Midwestern Psychological Association Conference and Arthur Olsen Symposium in 2020. Prior to that, she participated in the 2019 Pediatric Student Research Program at the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, where she was involved in the preliminary work investigating potential drug targets for medulloblastoma. In 2018, she was involved with the NIH-funded NF1 Porcine Model Collaborative Research Program at the Biomedical Scholars Summer Undergraduate Research Program at Iowa. 
 
"In the classroom, she is bar none, one of the best student-athletes I have had the privilege to coach in my 23 years," Melsted added. "Her thirst for knowledge and her love of learning are incredible examples to others.
 
"Her character though is what separates her from others. She is authentic and genuine in her dealings with people and the compassion she shows others will serve her well as she heads to medical school next year. I, along with my assistant coaches and her teammates couldn't be prouder. She's the best of the best."
 
Riemersma, hailing from Bloomington, Minnesota, is a CoSIDA Academic All-America honoree while majoring in Date Science. He owns a 3.99 GPA over his career which includes multiple All-NSIC selections. In 2019-20, he set an NSIC men's basketball record with 239 rebounds during the season while ranking eighth in the nation for total rebounds. In 2021, he earned a pair of NSIC Player of the Week honors and secured an NSIC season-high 22 rebounds in the Vikings' win over Wayne State. He tallied eight double-doubles over the season, ranking second in the league.
 
About the Kelly Scholar-Athlete Award:
The Kelly Award is named in honor of Willis R. Kelly, an associate professor of physical education at the University of Minnesota-Morris. A member of the NSIC Hall of Fame, Kelly also coordinated the Minnesota-Morris Physical Education Department from 1970-87. She became the first director of women's intercollegiate athletics at Minnesota-Morris in 1976 and was later promoted to athletics director for the whole department. Kelly passed away in 1988. The member institutions of the NSIC nominate one male and one female student-athlete for the Britton and Kelly Awards. The nominees must meet the following criteria: a grade point average of 3.5 or better (on a 4.0 scale); evidence of academic excellence beyond the minimum grade point average (scholarship prizes and other academic recognition), evidence of participation in the life of the institution, and evidence of participation in at least two-thirds of the varsity events of the individual's primary sport. The award is voted on by the NSIC Faculty Athletic Representatives.
 
The Kelley Scholar-Athlete Award honoree receives a $3,000 post-graduate scholarship.