Newton’s Garrett Sturtz scores several Missouri Valley Conference honors

ST. LOUIS — The Drake University men’s basketball team racked up several All-Missouri Valley Conference awards, the league announced last Tuesday.

Former Newton Cardinal standout Garrett Sturtz, a 2-time MVC all-bench selection, was named to the all-MVC second team.

Sturtz averages 11.0 points per game while leading Drake in rebounds at 7.5 per game. He also has a team-best 43 steals.

Tucker DeVries was named MVC Freshman of the Year for the Bulldogs.

Sturtz earns spot on MVC’s most improved team

ST. LOUIS — Sturtz was voted to the MVC Most Improved Team by the conference’s beat writers on Wednesday.

Sturtz has played in 31 games this season, including 17 starts, and is averaging 11.0 points and a team-best 7.5 rebounds per game in 29.6 minutes a night. He averaged 8.2 points and 5.5 rebounds per game last season.

Sturtz has recorded six double-doubles.

The Newton native started his Drake career as a walk-on and was selected to the MVC all-bench team the previous two seasons.

Sturtz named MVC scholar-athlete

ST. LOUIS — Drake University men’s basketball student-athletes Roman Penn, ShanQuan Hemphill and Sturtz all were recognized as MVC scholar-athletes by the conference’s sports information directors on Thursday.

Sturtz was elected to the MVC scholar athlete first team. He’s a senior marketing major with a 3.51 cumulative grade point average.

The criteria for the MVC’s scholar-athlete team voting parallels the CoSIDA (College Sports Information Directors of America) standards for Academic All-America voting.

Nominees must be starters or important reserves with at least a 3.30 cumulative GPA (4.0 scale). Nominees must have reached sophomore athletic and academic standing at an institution and must have completed at least one calendar year at the institution. A nominee must have played in 50 percent of his team’s games.