BATON ROUGE – LSU’s senior goalkeeper Mo Isom is one of 30 women’s soccer players from across the country to be selected Wednesday morning a candidate for the 2011 Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award for NCAA women’s soccer with her achievement of excellence both on and off the field during her career.
For a student-athlete to receive consideration for the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award, she is to be classified as an NCAA Division I senior and have notable achievements in four areas of excellence, including community, classroom, character and competition.
An acronym for Celebrating Loyalty and Achievement for Staying in School, the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award focuses on the total student-athlete experience, and encourages these students to use their platform in athletics to make a positive impact as leaders in their respective communities.
Isom has been a leader both on and off the field since her arrival at LSU prior to the 2008 season. She has proven herself as one of the premier goalkeepers in the history of the Southeastern Conference. While starting 50 of 51 career games with the Tigers, she has posted the SEC’s No. 3-ranked goals against average for a career with a 0.78 GAA and is tied for the No. 10 spot on the SEC’s all-time list with her 22 career shutouts. Her 22 shutouts and 31 wins are LSU career records.
In 2009, Isom set LSU single-season records with 15 wins, 12 total shutouts and eight shutouts against the SEC opponents as the Tigers won their third-straight SEC West title and NCAA Tournament berth.
Among the athletic awards she has received include selections to the Soccer Buzz Freshman All-America Third Team, Soccer Buzz Central Region All-Freshman Team and SEC All-Freshman Team in 2008, as well as a pair of SEC Freshman of the Week and a pair of SEC Defensive Player of the Week honors for a career. She also trained with the Under-23 U.S. Women’s National Team in 2007 and 2008.
A native of Marietta, Ga., Isom has maintained a 3.0 cumulative grade-point average during her collegiate career while being named to the SEC Academic Honor Roll in 2008 and 2010. She is on pace to complete her degree in broadcast journalism with a minor in communication studies.
Isom certainly embodies the character required of a recipient of the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award, as she provides a great example about what it means to overcome adversity to thrive at the collegiate level.
Following her freshman season in 2008 in which she was named a Freshman All-American and All-SEC contender as one of the nation’s top young goalkeepers, her life took a sudden turn when her father, John Isom, committed suicide in January 2009. In the wake of her father’s death, she suffered another setback following her sophomore season in 2009 when she suffered a near fatal car accident while traveling home to Marietta, Ga., for the Thanksgiving holiday in November 2009.
Isom came away from the accident with a neck injury that kept her from action for the 2010 spring season while preparing for her junior campaign.
While displaying such character to overcome this type of personal struggle during her career, Isom picked up the Eye of the Tiger Award by LSU’s Tiger Athletic Foundation and the Wilma Rudolph Student-Athlete Achievement Award between her sophomore and junior seasons in the spring of 2010.
The Eye of the Tiger Award is presented by the TAF each season to the LSU student-athlete who exhibits perseverance and thrives on and off the field while overcoming adversity. The Wilma Rudolph Student-Athlete Achievement Award is presented each year by the National Association of Academic Advisors for Athletics to honor such student-athletes who overcome such personal, academic and emotional odds to achieve academic success while competing in intercollegiate athletics.
Isom has also been a campus leader in community service throughout her career at LSU. Most notably she has been invited to share her personal story of struggle and redemption in more than 50 speaking engagements in Baton Rouge, her home in the Atlanta area and across the Southeast from the fall of 2010. This includes speaking to schools, churches, youth groups and soccer clubs as she seeks to inspire other in the pursuit of excellence in their own lives.
Among the community service projects she has taken part include work with the Baton Rouge chapter for Habitat for Humanity. She also works independently as a volunteer at the Battered Women’s Shelter at the St. Vincent De Paul shelter located near the LSU campus in Baton Rouge.
In addition, the LSU soccer team has mentored students at University Terrace Elementary School for over two years, to which Isom has been a mentor and friend to an 8-year-old second grader named Tyler.
The following list of 30 candidates for the Lowe’s Senior CLASS Award for women’s college soccer will be narrowed to 10 finalists midway through the regular season.
Official ballots for this year’s women’s soccer award will be distributed through a nationwide voting system to media, coaches and fans selecting one candidate who best exemplifies excellence in the four Cs of community, classroom, character and competition. The award’s recipient will be announced during the 2011 NCAA Women’s College Cup to be held Dec. 2-4 in Kennesaw, Ga.
Women’s Soccer Candidates
Melanie Baskind, Forward/Midfielder, Harvard
Jana Basubas, Midfielder, Lehigh
Kathleen Belijan, Defender, Dayton
Sidra Bonner, Defender, Cornell
Colleen Boyd, Goalkeeper, Oregon State
Kate Deines, Midfielder, Washington
Danielle Foxhoven, Forward, Portland
Katy Frierson, Midfielder, Auburn
CoCo Goodson, Defender, UC-Irvine
Chelsea Hatcher, Forward/Midfielder, Tennessee
Melissa Henderson, Forward, Notre Dame
Bianca Henninger, Goalkeeper, Santa Clara
Laura Heyboer, Forward, Michigan State
Tori Huster, Midfielder, Florida State
Mo Isom, Goalkeeper, LSU
Kelsey Kearney, Goalkeeper, UNC-Greensboro
Natalie Kulla, Goalkeeper, Marquette
Sydney Leroux, Forward, UCLA
Krista Lopez, Forward, Oklahoma State
Paige Maxwell, Forward, Ohio State
Kerry McBride, Midfielder/Defender, Marquette
Teresa Noyola, Midfielder, Stanford
Kelly Reinwald, Midfielder, Canisius
Aline Reis, Goalkeeper, Central Florida
Chandra Salmon-Christensen, Defender, Utah State
Casey Short, Midfielder, Florida State
Lizzy Simonin, Defender, Memphis
Jasmyne Spencer, Forward, Maryland
Jessica Teahan, Goalkeeper, Missouri State
Ingrid Wells, Midfielder, Georgetown