LOS ANGELES – The Big Ten Conference announced Monday that 1,984 students on varsity rosters have earned the Big Ten Distinguished Scholar Award. The list includes students from all 18 institutions who have recorded a minimum grade-point average (GPA) of 3.7 or higher for the previous academic year.

The 2024-25 class of Distinguished Scholar Award Recipients includes 95 Bruins who maintained a 3.7 GPA or higher during the previous academic term.

Women’s Swimming and Diving led the way with 15 honorees, while women’s rowing had 12 student-athletes listed, and women’s beach volleyball rounded out the top three teams with 10 individuals on the list.

Big Ten Faculty Representatives established the Distinguished Scholar Award in 2008 to supplement the Academic All-Big Ten program. Distinguished Scholar Award recipients must have earned Academic All-Big Ten recognition in the previous academic year, must have been enrolled full time at the institution for the entire previous academic year (two semesters or three quarters) and earned a minimum GPA of 3.70 or better during the previous academic year, excluding any summer grades. The Academic All-Big Ten threshold is a cumulative GPA of 3.0 or higher for a student’s academic career.

Baseball (3)
Michael Barnett (Political Science), James Hepp (Education), AJ Salgado (Project Management)

Men’s Basketball (1)
Lazar Stefanovic (Sociology)

Women’s Basketball (1)
Kiki Rice (Communication)

Football (7)
Josh Carlin (Education), Jack Clarke (Undeclared), Devin Delgado (Education & Social Transformation), Devanti Dillard (Statistics), Hudson Habermehl (Legal Studies), Jack Pedersen (Political Science), Caleb Walker (Sociology)

Men’s Track & Field/Cross Country (3)
Patrick Curulla (Business Economics), Kris Emig (Education), Shawn Toney (Business Economics)

Women’s Track & Field/Cross Country (7) 
Audrey Allen (Communication), Carly Corsinita (Marketing), Sydney Johnson (Biology), Mia Kane (Psychobiology), Rose Pittman (Education), Annika Salz (Mathematics & Linguistics), Sonia Virk (Psychobiology)

Men’s Golf (2)
Luke Powell (Undeclared), Matthew Yamin (Political Science)

Women’s Gymnastics (6)
Madisyn Anyimi (Applied Mathematics), Chae Campbell (Education), Frida Esparza (Marketing), Brooklyn Moors (Project Management), Katelyn Rosen (Communication), Clara Wren (Education and Social Transformation)

Women’s Rowing (12) 
Danielle DeFrancisci (Statistics & Data Science), Andrea Djuric (Public Health), Sofia Kalafatis (Biochemistry), Rachel Katz (Human Biology & Society), Audrey Loeb (Anthropology), Sophia Manos       (Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology), Tzippy Moehringer (Spanish), Kamryn Monster (Political Science), Ella O’Neil (Cognitive Science), Anika Roche (Political Science & Gender Studies), Faye Turcotte (Cognitive Science), Charlotte Winn (Mechanical Engineering)

Men’s Soccer (2)
Jose Contell (Education), Pablo Greenlee (Education)

Women’s Soccer (6)
Sofia Cook (International Development Studies), Kirsten Crane (Psychology), Maya Evans (Education), Quincy McMahon (Cognitive Science), Jayden Perry (Sociology), Lilly Reale (Sociology)

Softball (2)
Seneca Curo (Education), Savannah Pola (Sociology)

Women’s Swimming and Diving (15)
Eva Carlson (Psychology), Joanie Cash (Education), Riley Dix (Psychobiology), Elena Dry (Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology), Laura Fisher (Chemistry), Morgan Hawes (Communication), Ana Jih-Schiff (Psychology), Ava Lachey (Communication), Kathryn Lundh (Psychology), Paige MacEachern (Psychology), Emma Matous (International Development Studies), Katy Pacher (Global Studies), Angela Quan (Computer Science), Maya Salvitti (English), Amy Zhang (Electrical Engineering)

Men’s Tennis (2)
Alexander Hoogmartens (Economics), Giacomo Revelli (Cognitive Science)

Women’s Tennis (2)
Ahmani Guichard (Communication), Mia Jovic (Business Economics)

Women’s Volleyball (5)
Brooklyn Briscoe (Communication), Anna Dodson (Education), Peyton Dueck (Sociology), Kat Lutz (Psychology), Katie McCarthy (Economics & Political Science)

Men’s Volleyball (2)
Kahale Clini (Sociology), Coleman McDonough (Political Science)

Women’s Beach Volleyball (10)
Maggie Boyd (Psychology), Peri Brennan (Education), Cassie Dodd (Political Science), Hannah Fleming (Communication), Reagan Hope (Sociology), Sophie Moore (Business and Management of Entertainment), Natalie Myszkowski (Education), Jessie Smith (Education), Ky Vaickus (Cognitive Science), Tessa Van Winkle (Education)

Men’s Water Polo (1)
Max Matthews (Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology)

Women’s Water Polo (6)
Lily Gess (History), Alexsa Gimenez (Undeclared), Sienna Green (Economics), Natasha Kieckhafer (Public Affairs), Joey Niz (Undeclared), Olivia Ouellette (Undeclared)
 

Volleyball is one of the fastest rising sports in the entire country. Specifically, the NCAA has made it a big deal to promote the sport. Nebraska has become the biggest name in the game and set a record crowd of 92,000 in attendance for one of its games in 2023. In Georgia, the sport is growing into a spectacle that many fans are excited to watch.

Heated East Cobb rivals Pope and Walton are two of the best teams in the state. Pope is the defending 5A champion and has won state in two out of the last three years and is the definition of a modern dynasty. The Greyhounds return star players Lyden Harvey (who recorded 208 kills last season), Isabelle Andre (who had a .250 hitting percentage last season), and rising sophomore Lyla Skapinetz.

As for Walton, the Raiders went to the state championship two years ago before falling to North Cobb and are coming off a state semifinals appearance, again falling to North Cobb. This year, Walton has a new head coach in Ashley Jones and returns a lot of key players including Simone Searles (Duquesne commit), Janie Myers (listed as a top-50 sophomore according to Volleyball Adrenaline), and Scarlett Holden (led team in 2024 with 59 blocks).

The two teams recently announced (first reported by the Marietta Daily Journal) that they will play in an outdoor game, hosted at Pope’s football stadium.  The game will take place at 7:30 p.m. on Saturday, August 9th.

The pair faced off last season with the Raiders pulling out a 2-0 win (29-27, 19-25). The 2025 addition of this matchup is sure to draw a crowd that will be one of the largest in Georgia volleyball history.

Pope has two games scheduled before its match against Walton, playing Roswell and Kell. The Raiders have not reported a full schedule as off now.

If you are still not sold on this game, let’s sum it up. Two rivals, separated by a 10-minute drive, featuring a defending state champion, with both as title favorites this season, who played a tight game last season, all on a Saturday night in a football stadium after the first week that school is back. This game will be a must-see affair for any fan looking for something to do on a Saturday night.

Big Ten Announces 2024-25 Distinguished Scholars

July 14, 2025 | Football, USC Athletics, Men’s Basketball, Men’s Swimming & Diving, Men’s Tennis, Men’s Water Polo, Track & Field, Women’s Basketball, Women’s Lacrosse, Women’s Rowing, Women’s Soccer, Women’s Swimming & Diving, Women’s Tennis, Women’s Volleyball, Women’s Water Polo, Women’s Beach Volleyball, Swim & Dive

July 14, 2025

University of Wisconsin-Whitewater alum Chris Bitz has always enjoyed numbers, whether it was calculating them in a classroom, punching them into an Excel spreadsheet, or seeing them displayed after his latest pole vault attempt.

Bitz, who earned a B.S. in mathematics in 2023, was a four-year member of the Warhawk men’s track and field team. Now he is thriving as an actuarial analyst for Nationwide in downtown Milwaukee.

He’s been with the company since starting there as an intern in November of 2021, just under halfway through his junior year. He remained an intern through his senior year, focusing on manual group processes, before earning an offer to stay on full time.

“The internship helped with using Excel on a day-to-day basis,” Bitz said. “Once I got further into the internship, then it was about how I can make the right decisions based on the data, which is something UW-Whitewater helps to get at through a couple classes.”

The experience has come full circle for Bitz, who has been managing one intern for each of the last two years. (Nationwide currently employs an intern from UW-Whitewater who doesn’t report to Bitz.) Day to day, he is concentrated strategically on where the best areas of business exist and what areas the company should be targeting.

The textbook definition of what an actuary does is assess financial risk for businesses, including insurance companies, but Bitz believes it’s much more than that.

“I think there are a lot of areas within actuarial science,” he said. “For example, I work on our first-year pricing team, so groups coming to us for the first time looking for health insurance, we’ll price them as a group to see where they should be at. There’s a bunch of different fields within actuarial sciences.”

A fulfilling Warhawk experience

Bitz took an accounting course as a freshman at Brookfield East High School and said he didn’t love it. His mother, Maria, who attended UW-Whitewater, asked him if he had heard of actuarial math and science and suggested that as a career path.

By his junior year of high school, he knew he wanted to become an actuary.

“I knew very early on that math was my thing,” Bitz said. “From a young age, I was always very good at math — I like the numbers part of it.”

Bitz’s desire to continue his athletic career as a pole vaulter in track and field — along with the university’s reputation for the actuarial science emphasis — led him to UW-Whitewater. He connected to pole vault coach Nathan Wells and head track and field coach Mike Johnson before making his decision to join the Warhawk family.

After a period of adjustment and learning, UW-Whitewater felt like home to Bitz.

“It takes a lot of time to settle in — being on your own for the first time, living in a dorm, having a roommate, all those kinds of things,” he said. “I think I finally got to a point where I was comfortable, and the campus felt like where I should be, and the team felt like family.”

Bitz found a high level of comfort — and success — as a student-athlete. He placed among the top seven in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference four times, including a sixth-place finish at the 2022 outdoor conference championship meet, and recorded his personal best mark at his second-to-last collegiate competition.

He served as a captain during his senior year in 2023 and was honored numerous times for academics and sportsmanship during his career. He was also recognized as a UW-Whitewater Chancellor’s Scholar-Athlete and earned his third straight All-Academic award from the United States Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association as a senior.

“(NCAA) Division III was a perfect mix for me,” Bitz said. “I love my sport and wanted to put a lot of time into it, and I had the ability to do that while also focusing on academics.

“UW-Whitewater did a good job of balancing the two and making it clear, saying ‘yes, you are an athlete for this track team, but you’re also a student, and that matters more.’”

Bitz said many of his current best friends — including his roommate, CJ Pfeil — were part of the track and field program. He regularly attends the program’s Alumni Meet and currently coaches track and field at Brookfield East High School, his alma mater.

While on campus, Bitz was also part of the university’s Actuarial Club, which helps future actuaries learn, network, and develop skills necessary in the profession. As part of the group, he virtually attended the Wisconsin Actuarial Collegiate Conference, where he landed his internship that led to his full-time job with Nationwide.

“It made it very easy to learn a lot more about the career and connect with people who know more,” he said. “By the time I got to my junior and senior years, I felt much more prepared having been in that club.”

Bitz, who was a recipient of the Chancellor’s Scholarship, also shouted out mathematics faculty members Geethamali Samaranayake and Wesley Hough for positively influencing his time at the university. He served as a supplemental instructor for one of Hough’s classes and was a math tutor in Campus Tutorial Services.

A promising path to career success

Bitz hopes to secure his certification from the Fellow of the Society of Actuaries (FSA) and continue building his career at Nationwide to a managerial level.

He continues to put what he learned at UW-Whitewater into practice. He cited his preparation for exams — a critical part of an actuary’s career — as something the university helped him with.

There are 10 exams to pass to become fully certified as an actuary — Bitz has passed four and is waiting on results from a fifth.

“UW-Whitewater offers a couple classes that get you in the door for those exams and teach you the basics for the first two,” he said. “It gives you a grounding of where to start, and you can build on that for the next eight exams — or however many you decide to do.”