March 10, 2011
DAVIS, Calif. - Women's swimmer and water polo player Ashley Chandler and men's cross country and track and field student-athlete Calvin Thigpen have been selected as the UC Davis recipients of the 2010-11 Big West Conference Scholar-Athlete of the Year awards. Both will be honored Thursday, Mar. 10 at a banquet at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Garden Grove, Calif.
As a swimmer, Chandler earned second-team All-Big West Conference honors in 2009, then redshirted the 2010 water polo season, opting to join the Aggie swimming and diving team last season. Despite not having swum competitively since her prep years, she became a major factor in UC Davis winning the final Big West Conference team championship. Chandler won the 100-yard backstroke with a school-record 54.03, while leading off the 400 medley relay to a league title and another school mark of 3:42.52. She set a third school benchmark at the Big West meet with a 50 free time of 22.90 in the first leg of the 200 free relay, then took part in a fourth as a member of the 400 free relay.
Chandler is a three-time All-Academic honoree by the Association of Collegiate Water Polo Coaches (ACWPC) and has garnered a total of four academic all-conference awards in her two sports. She is an English major who has twice won the department's Alfred J. Hoefer Memorial Scholarship.
Thigpen's 2010 cross country season stands out as arguably the best campaign during the senior's UC Davis career. As he continued to rehabilitate several nagging injuries, he earned four top-20 finishes and two top-five placings during the season. His third-place finish at the 2010 Big West Conference Championships helped lead the UC Davis men's team to its first ever league title. He finished 20th overall at the NCAA West Regional Championship in a time of 30:35.95, earning All-Region accolades from the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association. His success resulted in the Aggies recognizing him as Most Improved, a team award he also received in his sophomore season.
For his work in the classroom, Thigpen, an evolution, ecology and biodiversity major, was named to the Big West Conference Fall All-Academic team, an honor he has achieved all three years he has been eligible.
Chandler and Thigpen wil be honored alongside the recipients from the other eight Big West Conference institutions in conjunction with the Big West basketball tournaments taking place at the Honda Center in Anaheim.
