Lohmeier Selected as a William V. Campbell Trophy Semifinalist
(IRVING, Texas) – Selected as the best and brightest from the college gridiron, The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame (NFF) announced the 185 semifinalists for the 2019 William V. Campbell Trophy, presented by Mazda. The award recognizes an individual as the absolute best scholar-athlete in the nation and is prominently displayed inside its official home at the New York Athletic Club. Carnegie Mellon's senior defensive end Michael Lohmeier (Clarendon Hills, Ill./Hinsdale Central) is one of 49 Division III players on the list of 185 student-athletes.
Of the 49 Division III student-athletes, Lohmeier is joined by Isaac Withrow of Case Western Reserve University and Matt Crawford of Thiel College as the three semifinalists from the Presidents' Athletic Conference (PAC).
Through three games this season, Lohmeier has nine tackles, seven solo, 2.5 tackles for a loss, 0.5 sacks, forced a fumble and recovered another. He currently ranks 11th on the school's all-time sack list with 11.5 for his career. The senior is a two-time All-PAC and All-University Athletic Association (UAA) selection.
Lohmeier, a two-time CoSIDA Academic All-American, carries a 4.00 GPA as a business administration major. He is a two-time UAA President Scholar-Athlete Team honoree, which recognizes student-athletes who earn first-team accolades and carry a 3.50 or greater cumulative grade-point average during the playing season. He is also a PAC honor roll and UAA All-Academic honoree.
This past summer, Lohmeier was an investment banking analyst at Lazard in New York City. Also off the field, he has been a market research analyst for Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation in Chicago. During the summer of 2018, Lohmeier worked as an equity research analyst for Robotti Securities & Company in New York.
The 2019 Tartan captain has volunteered at the Western Spring Sectional competition of the Special Olympics of Pennsylvania. Lohmeier is currently the liaison for the Tartans football team calendar fundraiser for the Pittsburgh Children's Hospital. He is an undergraduate analyst intern for Scottie Ventures and a member of Alpha Sigma Phi fraternity where he has served as the philanthropy and fundraising chair.
To be nominated for the William V. Campbell Trophy, student-athletes need to be submitted by their schools, which are limited to one nominee each. Candidates for the awards must be a senior or graduate student in their final year of eligibility, have a GPA of at least 3.2 on a 4.0 scale, have outstanding football ability as a first team player or significant contributor and have demonstrated strong leadership and citizenship. The class is selected each year by the NFF Awards Committee, which is comprised of a nationally recognized group of media, College Football Hall of Famers and athletics administrators.
Named in honor of the late Bill Campbell, former chairman of Intuit, former player and head coach at Columbia University and the 2004 recipient of the NFF's Gold Medal, the Campbell Trophy is a 25-pound bronze trophy and increases the amount of the recipient's grant by $7,000 for a total postgraduate scholarship of $25,000. This year's postgraduate scholarships will push the program's all-time distribution to more than $11.3 million.
Launched in 1959, the NFF National Scholar-Athlete Awards program became the first initiative in history to award postgraduate scholarships based on both a player's academic and athletic accomplishments, and it has recognized 854 outstanding individuals since its inception. The Campbell Trophy, first awarded in 1990, adds to the program's prestige, having previously honored two Rhodes Scholars, a Rhodes Scholar finalist, two Heisman Trophy winners and five first-round NFL draft picks.
The NFF will announce 12-14 finalists on October 30, and each of them will receive an $18,000 postgraduate scholarship as a member of the NFF National Scholar-Athlete Class, presented by Mazda. The finalists will travel to New York City for the 62nd NFF Annual Awards Dinner on Dec. 10, where their accomplishments will be highlighted in front of one of the most powerful audiences in all of sports. At the event, one member of the class will be declared the winner of the 30th William V. Campbell Trophy and have his postgraduate scholarship increased to $25,000.