Minnesota Volleyball: Samantha Seliger-Swenson Named Big Ten Player of the Year

Senior setter Samantha Seliger-Swenson was named the Big Ten Volleyball Player of the Year on Wednesday as the Minnesota Golden Gophers volleyball team took home multiple year end awards from the Big Ten. In addition to SSS, Gopher head coach Hugh McCutcheon was named the Big Ten Coach of the Year. Minnesota placed three players on the All-Big Ten First Team and three on the Second team as well.

Seliger-Swenson becomes the first setter to win the Big Ten Player of the Year award since 2014, and the third Gopher to win the award in the last four seasons. She also took home Big Ten Co-Setter of the Year and First Team All-Big Ten honors. She has been nothing but amazing for Minnesota this season. She leads the Gophers with 31 aces and 239 digs on the season. During the conference season, she was named the Big Ten Setter of the Week seven consecutive times. All she does in win awards as SSS was the 2015 Freshman of the Year, a two-time Setter of the Year (2016, 2018) and now Big Ten Player of the Year. She is also a three-time All-American and is a shoe in to be named to a fourth straight team when it is announced in three weeks.

McCutcheon was named the Big Ten Coach of the Year for the second time in his seven year Gopher career. He also won the award in 2015. The Gophers won the Big Ten with a 19-1 record and are currently ranked #3 in the nation in the coaches poll and are the #2 overall NCAA seed as the NCAA Tournament begins on Friday.

Joining Seliger-Swenson on the All-Big Ten First team were Stephanie Samedy and Regan Pittman. Samedy is a sophomore opposite hitter who now makes it two for two in All-Big Ten honors. She leads the Gophers with 326 kills on the season and averages 3.51 kills per set while hitting .294. Samedy also has 275 digs this year helping her to a team leading 14 double-doubles this season,

Pittman is a redshirt sophomore middle blocker who led the Gophers with a .407 hitting percentage this season which ranked second in the Big Ten. She also leads the Gophers with 107 blocks,

Minnesota also placed three members on the All-Big Ten second team in Alexis Hart, Taylor Morgan and Adanna Rollins.

Hart is a junior outside hitter. She dealt with injuries earlier in the season and battled back to rank second on the team with 257 kills.

Morgan is a redshirt junior middle blocker. Morgan ranks second in the team in hitting percentage (.390) and fourth in the Big Ten. As a first-year starter for the Gophers, Morgan has 228 kills in 454 attempts.

Rollins in a freshman outside hitter. She was named a four-time Big Ten Freshman of the Week this season and ranks fourth on the team with 248 kills and kills per set (2.56). Rollins was also named to the Big Ten All-Freshman team.

Joining her on the All-Freshman team was Gopher libero CC McGraw. McGraw has played in all 97 sets as the Gophers’ starting libero. Named the Big Ten Freshman of the Week twice this season, McGraw averaged 4.10 digs per set in conference action and 3.97 in all matches.

Additionally Lauren Barnes was named the Gophers honoree of the Big Ten Sportsmanship Award,

The Gophers kick off NCAA Tournament play Friday night at the Pav against Bentley.