Morningside’s Jacob Green, Lauren Lehmkuhl and David Nash are among the GPAC nominees for several prestigious NAIA national awards.

Jacob Green, Lauren Lehmkuhl and David Nash are the GPAC nominees for three of the top NAIA national awards for the 2016-17 academic year.

Green is the GPAC’s male nominee for the A.O. Duer Award, Lehmkuhl is the GPAC’s female nominee for the Emil S. Liston Award and Nash is the GPAC nominee for the NAIA Coach of Character Award.

The A.O. Duer Scholarship Award is named in honor of the NAIA’s former executive secretary who served the association for 26 years. The award has been presented annually since 1967 to a male and female student-athlete completing their junior season in any sport who has excellent scholarship, character and citizenship.

Green, a senior from Sioux Falls, S.D., is a member of the Mustangs’ cross country and track & field teams. Green has a cumulative grade point average (GPA) of 3.88 and is majoring in chemistry and biology. Green has earned NAIA All-America honors in track & field five times, most recently when he helped lead Morningside to an eighth place finish in the 3200-meter relay at the 2017 NAIA Outdoor Track & Field National Championships. He also earned All-America honors this past year with a seventh place finish in the 1000-meters and a fifth place finish in the 3200-meter relay at the 2017 NAIA Indoor National Championships.

Green is a member of Morningside’s Dean’s Honor List. He serves as treasurer of Morningside’s Beta Beta Beta biology honor society, is vice-president of Omicron Delta Kappa leadership honor society, a member of the Phi Eta Sigma honor society and a volunteer for numerous organizations in the Sioux City area.

The Emil S. Liston Award is named in honor of the NAIA’s first executive secretary and the prime mover behind the NAIA’s Men’s Basketball National Tournament. The award has been presented annually since 1950 to one junior men’s and one junior women’s basketball student-athlete who has shown high athletic and scholastic achievement.

Lehmkuhl, a senior forward from Wakefield, Neb., has a 3.83 cumulative GPA with majors in advertising and graphic design. She is a captain of the Mustangs’ women’s basketball team and was a second-team All-GPAC performer and a Daktronics-NAIA Scholar-Athlete in the 2016-17 season.

Lehmkuhl has been active with her teammates as a volunteer with Sioux City community organizations such as Convoy of Hope, Walking School Bus, Bodie Boys support of March of Dimes, Into the Streets and the local Boys Club. The Mustang women’s basketball team is also active with local elementary schools as part of the NAIA Champions of Character program.

The Coach of Character Award is given to a head coach who has been outstanding in embracing the five core values of the NAIA Champions of Character initiative by deliberately teaching character to their student-athletes through sport.

Nash is the head coach of Morningside’s men’s and women’s cross country and track & field teams. Under Nash, the Mustangs’ track & field program has produced six NAIA National Champions and 69 NAIA All-America performances over the past 14 seasons. Nash was the 2016 Hauff Mid-America Sports/GPAC Women’s Cross Country Coach of the Year after he guided the Mustangs to their first-ever GPAC championship. He has earned GPAC Coach of the Year honors eight times during his career.

Widely respected by other schools in the GPAC and the NAIA, Nash’s teams exemplify the NAIA Champions of Character program. Respect is a key component to the Mustangs’ team formation as they greet each other by name each day in practice as well as on campus and shake the officials/workers/volunteers’ hands after meets and competitions. Nash’s teams are involved in various community service efforts and his 2012 women’s cross country team was the national recipient of the Buffalo Funds NAIA Champions of Character Team Award.

The national winners will be announced during the 2017 NAIA National Awards Day on Sept. 15.