Junior Yinan Lu of Marian University women’s golf has been selected as the NACC Athlete of the Year, as voted on by the head coaches of the league.

Lu continued to cement herself as one of the best golfers in Marian history resetting her own single-season stroke average record for a third straight season.  She closed out the year with a 76.6 stroke average over 16 rounds, nearly a full stroke over the next best golfer in the conference.  Lu was the only student-athlete in the NACC this year to finish with multiple rounds at or below par this season after an even-par 72 in the second round of the Ives Grove Firebird Fall Classic and an even-par 71 at the final round of the NACC Championship.  She posted four of the best 14 18-hole scores in the conference finishing the season with 13 rounds of 80 or fewer strokes.

She earned medalist recognition at four events this season to go with a top-five finish at five other events.  Lu earned NACC medalist recognition for the second time in three seasons after putting together rounds of 76, 75, and a career-best 71 to finish 9-over par.  She was also the medalist at the Marian Invitational, Benedictine Fall Invitational, and Edgewood Fall Inviational.  

Lu is the first Sabre to earn NACC Athlete of the Year recognition in program history and just the second major award winner.  Megan Kelly is the other major award winner after being named the NACC Freshman of the Year in 2014.  She also earned NACC Student-Athlete of the Week recognition three times.

The full release from the NACC can be found at https://naccsports.org/sports/wgolf