Bulldogs earn AVCA Team Academic Award for 2015-16 performance in classroom

SMITHFIELD, R.I. – For the third-straight season, the Bryant University volleyball team has been named among the 132 NCAA Division I women's teams to receive the 2015-16 AVCA Team Academic Award, as announced by the American Volleyball Coaches Association.

The Bulldogs are one of four schools out of the Northeast Conference to receive the prestigious honor, joined by Central Connecticut, Fairleigh Dickinson and LIU Brooklyn.

A total of 764 teams have earned the AVCA Team Academic Award for the 2015-16 season, a number that breaks the previous year's total of 757 and sets a new all-time high for this award. The award, which was initiated in the 1992-93 academic year, honors collegiate and high school volleyball teams that displayed excellence in the classroom during the school year by maintaining at least a 3.30 cumulative team grade point average on a 4.0 scale.

The AVCA Team Academic Award is the single largest award offered by quantity of schools, players and coaches honored. Since the 2000-01 season, the number of recipients have increased every single year but two, while amassing a 477-team increase over the span of the last decade. Since the award's inception in 1993, the amount of award winners has increased from 62 to its current number of 764.

Over 1,000 different schools have earned the award in the program's 24-year history, with exactly 7,642 awards been given out in total. Bryant has earned the honor five times in its Division I tenure.

The Bulldogs open their 2016 season August 26-27, when they host the Hampton Inn-vitational at the Chace Athletic Center.