Westside Warriors alum Justin Schultz of the University of Wisconsin has been named WCHA Defensive Player of the Year and Vernon Vipers grad Chay Genoway of the University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux has been named the conference's Outstanding Student-Athlete of the Year.
West Kelowna native Schultz is the first sophomore to win the award and also earned All-WCHA First Team accolades. A draftee of the NHL’s Anaheim Ducks, Schultz is the second straight Badger to earn the league’s top defensive award, with defensemen Brendan Smith earning the honor in 2009-10.
Schultz’s 18 goals so far this season are the most for any defenceman in the country since the 2002-03 season and one off the UW record. He’s the nation’s leading point scorer among defencemen and also leads the Badgers with 46 points.
Genoway, who also earned All-WCHA First Team honors, is a two-time team captain, maintains a 3.56 cumulative grade-point average at North Dakota and will graduate in May with a BBA in management. After a season-ending injury last year, the Morden, Manitoba product went on to earn a 4.0 GPA in the fall of 2010, has done a team-leading 68.5 hours of community service during this academic year and was named an ESPN the Magazine All-American as a junior.
He is the fourth-highest scoring defenceman overall in the WCHA this season with 26 points (6g, 20a) despite missing eight games, ranked second in the WCHA in points per game by a defenseman at 0.95, leads all active WCHA defensemen with 116 career points
Genoway is also a finalist for the Lowe’s Senior Class Award and has earned UND’s Archie Krum Memorial Athletic Scholarship for “leadership qualities, high academic standards and athletic excellence” three years in a row.
