PULLMAN, Wash. – Recent Washington State graduate and Cougar rower, Paige Danielson, has been named to the 2018-19 Google Cloud Women's At-Large Academic All-America First Team, selected by CoSIDA, the organization announced Friday. 

A native of St. Cloud, Minn., Danielson was named to the All-District 8 Team in May, which made her eligible for All-America honors.  The women's at-large category includes student-athletes participating in bowling, fencing, field hockey, golf, gymnastics, ice hockey, lacrosse, rifle, rowing, skiing, swimming, tennis and water polo. Forty-five student-athletes from those sports are divided into three teams of 15 to make up the All-America First, Second and Third teams, as one of the first team honorees is also chosen as the Academic All-American of the Year. 

Danielson, a native of St. Cloud, Minn., graduated from Washington State in May with a degree in electrical engineering and a 4.0 grade point average. She is a three-time first team Pac-12 All-Academic, CRCA Scholar-Athlete and CoSIDA Academic All-District honoree. Last year Danielson was named to the Academic All-America Second Team. This year she was named the Pac-12 Women's Rowing Scholar-Athlete of the Year. She is also a two-time NCAA Elite 90 Award winner, given to the student-athlete with the highest GPA at each NCAA Championships site. Danielson was a member of Tau Beta Pi, the engineering honors society, and was the Honors Student Advisory Council president. She has worked as a research assistant for the Systems on Chips Lab, and as a hydropower intern for the US Army Corps of Engineers at the Lower Granite Lock and Dam the last two years. She plans to pursue her Ph.D. in electrical engineering at the University of Colorado next fall. Danielson also finds the time to give back to the Pullman community as a volunteer for Coug Pals, an organization that pairs WSU student-athletes with children from local elementary schools to be pen pals. 

On the water Danielson led the Cougars to NCAA top-14 finishes each of her first three seasons. She's a former walk-on who worked her way up to row with the varsity four as a freshman and with the varsity eight from her sophomore year on. She ended the 2019 season as the only senior rower in the varsity eight boat. 

The only other Cougar rower to receive CoSIDA Academic All-America honors was Katie Dick in 2013, as she picked up second team honors in her senior season. Dick was a three-time all-district honoree. Danielson's selection becomes the 19th time a WSU female student-athlete has been named to one of the Academic All-America teams and the fifth time a Cougar woman has been named first team. Danielson is the first Cougar female to be named First Team All-America since Whitney Evans of the track and field team in 2003. She's the first Cougar since baseball's Collin Slaybaugh in 2013.  

Stanford University water polo junior Makenzie Fischer was selected as the 2019 Google Cloud Academic All-America® Team Members of the Year for Division I women's at-large program. Forty-two of the 45 members of the 2019 Google Cloud Academic All-America® Division I Women's At-Large teams achieved at least a 3.90 GPA, with 33 student-athletes posting a 4.00 GPA (or better) during their undergraduate and/or graduate careers. All 15 members of the first team posted at least a 4.00 GPA, with their average GPA at 4.03. 

Including Danielson and Fischer, the Google Cloud Academic All-America® Division I Women's At-Large teams have 12 repeat honorees from last year's Google Cloud Academic All-America® Division I At-Large teams – Sofia Blanco (Oklahoma State University), Andie Daniell (University of Alabama), Katharine Irwin (University of New Mexico), Julie Mohagen (University of Utah), Petra Salko (University of Oregon), Asia Seidt (University of Kentucky), Ella Eastin (Stanford University), Alicia Finnigan (Liberty University), Kristin Quah (Vanderbilt University), and Lauren Tibbets (Butler University). 

For more information regarding the Google Cloud Academic All-America® program, visit https://academicallamerica.com/. 


2018-19 Google Cloud Academic All-America
Women's At-Large Team
Division I