BATON ROUGE, La. – On Thursday, 53 LSU student-athletes were named to the Southeastern Conference First Year Honor Roll the league announced, one day after 62 of their fellow teammates were named to the SEC’s Spring Honor Roll.
In all, the first-year student-athletes hailed from 12 of LSU’s various sports, with 11 having multiple honorees led by football with 10 selections. The women’s track and field team followed closely with nine honorees and men’s swimming and diving had seven selections. Gymnastics, men’s track and field, softball and women’s swimming and diving followed with four selections each. The baseball and volleyball team had three honorees apiece, soccer and women’s golf had two selections and men’s tennis rounded out the honor roll with one selection.
The football team finished the 2015-16 season with a 9-3 overall record and a win in the Texas Bowl. Toby Weathersby played in all 12 games during the 2015-16 football season, making one start at right tackle at Ole Miss. Long snapper Blake Ferguson and punter Josh Growden joined Weathersby on the list.
The Lady Tiger track and field team completed another stellar season in 2016 by finishing fifth in the SEC Outdoor Championships and ending the 2016 NCAA Division I Outdoor Track & Field Championships with a sixth-place finish.
Men’s swimming and diving’s Thomas Smith, an U.S. Olympic Trials qualifier backstroker out of Huntington Beach, California, set the school record in the 200 back and also earned a spot in the championship finals of the event at the SEC Championships.
The gymnastics team had the best finish in school history as it concluded the 2016 season as the national runner-up. Sarah Finnegan earned All-America honors, All-SEC honors and was named the SEC Freshman of the Week three times throughout the season. Finnegan and McKenna Kelley both earned SEC All-Freshman honors, and Lexie Priessman earned All-America honors during the 2016 campaign.
Leading the group of women’s swimming and diving was Gabrielle Pick, who is an U.S. Olympic Trails qualifier in the 100 butterfly and 200 butterfly. The women finished in seventh place during the 2016 Southeastern Conference Swimming and Diving Championships.
Jaron Flournoy was part of the 4×400-meter relay team that lined up as the most dominant sprint relay team throughout the 2016 men’s track and field season. He went out as a national champion, the ninth NCAA title in the event in school history.
The LSU baseball team won 45 games and was a postseason national seed for the fifth consecutive season. Right-handed pitcher Caleb Gilbert made 25 appearances and compiled five starts with a 5.04 ERA in 44.2 innings pitched and struck out 43 on the season.
The volleyball team was represented by Lindsay Flory who was second on the team in assists with 390 on the season. Olivia Beyer led the Tigers with 1.00 block per set, and Katie Kampen rounded out the volleyball selections, playing in 19 matches during the 2015 season.
A 2015 SEC All-Freshman Team member and the 2015 LSWA Louisiana Freshman of the Year, Alex Thomas earned a spot as the starting right back on the soccer team and ranked No. 59 on the TopDrawerSoccer.com Top 100 Freshman list during her first year with the Tigers. She was called up in January to the Under-20 U.S. Women’s National Team for a week-long training camp.
Kathleen Gallagher was recently named the Louisiana Freshman Golfer of the Year by the LSWA. She earned her second Mississippi Women’s Golf Association state amateur championship in early June. Both Gallagher and Marina Hedlund were in the lineup for the Baton Rouge Women’s Golf Regional.
Cameron Andry competed in 14 matches during the 2015-16 men’s tennis season. He compiled seven singles wins and three doubles wins with partner Boris Arias as the Tigers reached the second round of the NCAA Tournament for the second consecutive season.
The Cox Communications Academic Center for Student-Athletes is a 54,000 square foot facility comprised of academic affairs, student affairs and an information technology teams, serving more than 530 student-athletes. The purpose is to provide an all-inclusive, student-centered support structure for all student-athletes from matriculation, through graduation and life beyond.
Name, Sport, Major
Trent Forshag, Baseball, Civil Engineering
Caleb Gilbert, Baseball, Petroleum Engineering
O’Neal Lochridge, Baseball, General Business
Blake Ferguson, Football, Information Systems & Decision Science
Jack Gonsoulin, Football, General Business
Josh Growden, Football, Kinesiology
Deven Hammond, Football, Computer Engineering
Trey LaForge, Football, Finance
Ronnie Lamarque, Football, Marketing
Caleb Lewis, Football, Human Science & Education
Rory Luke, Football, Economics
Michael Ostrom, Football, General Business
Toby Weathersby, Football, Interdisciplinary Studies
Kathleen Gallagher, Women’s Golf, Communication Studies
Marina Hedlund, Women’s Golf, General Business
Sarah Finnegan, Gymnastics, Kinesiology
McKenna Kelley, Gymnastics, Psychology
Lexie Priessman, Gymnastics, Communication Studies
Kaitlyn Szafranski, Gymnastics, Kinesiology
Gabriela Maldonado, Soccer, Industrial Engineering
Alex Thomas, Soccer, Biology
Shemiah Sanchez, Softball, General Business
Amber Serrett, Softball, Kinesiology
Elyse Thornhill, Softball, Kinesiology
Alex Carson, Men’s Swimming and Diving, Mechanical Engineering
Harrison Jones, Men’s Swimming and Diving, Kinesiology
Matt Klotz, Men’s Swimming and Diving, Sport Administration
Mitchell Petras, Men’s Swimming and Diving, Petroleum Engineering
Thomas Smith, Men’s Swimming and Diving, Information Systems & Decision Science
Sophia Bisch, Women’s Swimming and Diving, Kinesiology
Lia Joslin, Women’s Swimming and Diving, Marketing
Rileigh Knox, Women’s Swimming and Diving, Mathematics
Gabrielle Pick, Women’s Swimming and Diving, Marketing
Cameron Andry, Men’s Tennis, Petroleum Engineering
Chadd Burns, Men’s Track and Field, Kinesiology
Jaron Flournoy, Men’s Track and Field, Undecided
Ross Quinlan, Men’s Track and Field, General Business
Daniel Tanner, Men’s Track and Field, Petroleum Engineering
Camille Arceneaux, Women’s Track and Field, Economics
Hannah Bourque, Women’s Track and Field, Kinesiology
Tahlaya Hardin, Women’s Track and Field, Accounting
Erika Lewis, Women’s Track and Field, Biology
Madison McDaniel, Women’s Track and Field, Finance
Cayla Nikodemus, Women’s Track and Field, Undecided
Mallory Robichaux, Women’s Track and Field, Biology
Naomi Smith, Women’s Track and Field, English
Amy Stelly, Women’s Track and Field, Kinesiology
Olivia Beyer, Volleyball, Undeclared
Lindsay Flory, Volleyball, Undeclared
Katie Kampen, Volleyball, Undeclared