BRENTWOOD, Tenn. -- Tennessee Tech's Meghan
O'Donoghue and UT Martin's Heather Butler
have been selected as the Ohio Valley Conference's nominees for the
NCAA Woman of the Year award. The award will be announced as the
Woman of the Year Awards dinner in Indianapolis on October 19.
Each conference nominates up to two women and from that group the
NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics (CWA) narrows it down to the
top 10 per division which will be announced in August. From those
30 candidates, the selection committee will determine the top three
in each division.
The NCAA Woman of the Year Award honors graduating
student-athletes who have distinguished themselves throughout their
collegiate careers in the areas of academic achievement, athletics
excellence, service and leadership. Student-athletes are nominated
only once in their career by their institution.
The NCAA CWA manages the nomination process and selections. In the
past five years, 676 student-athletes were nominated by their
conference or independent institutions, representing multiple
ethnicities and all NCAA-sponsored sports within Divisions I, II
and III. In 2013 alone, 455 student-athletes were nominated by
their institutions. From 1998 through 2005, an average of 410
female student-athletes per year were nominated for the award; and
since the program's inception in 1991, 2629 women have been
recognized as state or conference honorees.
O'Donoghue, a political science and French with a 4.00 GPA, has
been named to the Athletic Director's Honor eight times (2010-14)
and the OVC Commissioner's Honor four times (2011-14). She also
received the OVC Medal of Honor pick four times. She was awarded
the Who's Who among American University and Colleges for French and
Political Science. She was the secretary for the Student-Athlete
Advisory Committee (SAAC) and the treasurer of the Newman Campus
Catholic Ministries for the past two years. She has volunteered
with Hoops for Heroes and the Fill the End Zone canned food drive
as well as helping with numerous charity races.
The Talbott, Tenn., native was a member of the Tennessee Tech
Cross Country team 2010-13 while also running track for the Golden
Eagles. She earned the team's Most Dedicated Runner Award and the
team's Most Improved Award.
Next year, O'Donoghue will enter the Peace Corps as a Community
Health Development Volunteer in Burkina Faso, following several
months of volunteering with the Hope Center, a HIV/AIDS awareness
program and treatment clinic in Knoxville, Tenn.
Butler posted a 3.87 GPA as a health and human performance major.
She was named to the UT Martin Chancellor's Honor Roll and the OVC
Commissioner's Honor Roll each of her four years. Last year, Butler
was one of three female student-athletes to earn the OVC Scholar
Athlete Award. She has volunteered with the reading program
at local elementary schools as well as being an elementary and
middle school DARE program graduation speaker. She has helped with
women's basketball summer camps and the SAAC Can Caravan as well as
being a youth basketball coach.
Butler was a four-year team captain for the Skyhawks and led the
team to four straight OVC Tournament titles and NCAA appearances.
She was an All-OVC first team selection all four years of her
career along with being named the OVC Freshman of the Year in
2010-10 and the Player of the Year last season. She became the
league's all-time leading scorer with 2,865 career points which
also ranks 16th in the NCAA. Butler reached double
figures in all 129 games of her career, ranking as the second
longest streak in the nation. The mark also ranks fifth all-time in
the NCAA. The Medina, Tenn., native was also recently named the OVC
Female Athlete of the Year. She is currently a member of the San
Antonio Stars WNBA team.