Carl Söderlund Named 2019 ACC Men’s Tennis Scholar-Athlete of the Year
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. –Virginia men’s tennis junior Carl Soderlund (Stockholm, Sweden) has been named the 2019 ACC Men’s Tennis Scholar-Athlete of the Year in honors announced Friday (June 21) by the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Sophomore Gianni Ross (Chicago, Ill.) and freshmen Brandon Nakashima (San Diego, Calif.) and Ryan Goetz (Greenlawn, N.Y.) joined Söderlund on the 2019 All-ACC Academic Team.
Söderlund, the 2019 ACC Men’s Tennis Player of the Year and Atlantic Region Player to Watch, earned All-America recognition by finishing the regular-season ranked No. 3 in the Oracle ITA singles rankings. The first-team All-ACC honoree finished this year with a 20-5 mark in singles, including 13 wins over ranked opponents. Söderlund, who will be living on The Lawn next year, was named the Virginia athletics department’s male scholar athlete of the year at the Hoos Choice awards in May. This is his third time being named to the All-Academic team.
This is the fifth time that a Virginia player has been named the ACC Men’s Tennis Scholar-Athlete of the Year. Söderlund joins Dominic Inglot (2008 and 2009), Mitchell Frank (2014) and Thai-Son Kwiatkowski (2016 and 2017) in the list of Cavaliers who have earned the accolade.
Ross had a team-best 21 singles victories, including a 14-7 mark in duals and a 7-1 record in conference play. He also tallied 20 wins in doubles with a 14-9 record in dual matches. Ross clinched the victory for the Cavaliers in both their first and second round NCAA matches this year. This is his first All-ACC Academic Team honor.
Nakashima joined the team in January and made an immediate impact, posting a 17-5 record in singles and a 20-3 record in doubles, including going 3-0 in singles in the NCAA Championship and 4-0 in doubles. The ACC Freshman of the Year and Atlantic Region Rookie of the Year finished the year ranked in both doubles (No. 11) and singles (No. 64). He was the only freshman to earn first team All-ACC honors this season.
Goetz finished his rookie year with a 20-14 record in singles. He began his collegiate career with a runner-up finish at the ITA Atlantic Regional in October and advanced to the second round of singles at the Oracle ITA National Fall Championships. He finished the fall ranked No. 54 in singles as was ranked as high as No. 72 in the spring.
The Virginia men’s tennis team, as a whole, had an exceptional spring semester academically, posting a 3.45 team GPA, the highest among the men’s teams in the department and the highest semester GPA on record for UVA men’s tennis. This is the 16th-straight semester of posting a team GPA of 3.0 or higher.
Minimum academic requirements for selection to the All-ACC Academic Team are a 3.0 grade point average for the previous semester and a 3.0 cumulative average during one’s academic career for undergraduate students. Athletic achievements during the most recent season are also considered in selecting the All-ACC Academic Team.
The ACC Honor Roll, which recognizes all conference student-athletes with a grade point average of 3.0 for the current academic year, will be released in July.