Duffy advances as Summit nominee for NCAA Woman of the Year
VERMILLION, S.D. (GoYotes.com) —South Dakota women’s basketball player Ciara Duffy Eastmo has been selected as The Summit League’s nominee for the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year award.
The NCAA Woman of the Year award was established in 1991 to recognize graduating female student-athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves in academics, athletics, service and leadership throughout their collegiate careers.
Duffy is one of 161 college athletes who have advanced as conference-level nominees and one of 59 at the NCAA Division I level. There were a record 605 institutional-level nominees this year across the three divisions.
The Woman of the Year Selection Committee, made up of representatives from NCAA membership, will now choose the Top 30 honorees – 10 from each division – from the conference level nominees. The Top 30 honorees will be announced in September. From there, the selection committee will narrow the pool to three finalists from each division. The NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics will select the 2020 Woman of the Year from the nine finalists.
Duffy is one of nine NCAA Division I women’s basketball players on the conference-level nominee list.
A native of Rapid City, South Dakota, Duffy graduated summa cum laude in 2019 from the University of South Dakota with a double-major in political science and history. This past season, she worked towards her master’s degree in interdisciplinary studies while carrying her 4.00 GPA into graduate-level work.
Duffy’s senior season accolades include espnW Mid-Major Player of the Year, the Becky Hammon Mid-Major Player of the Year, the Summit League Player of the Year, Associated Press All-America honorable mention and the University of South Dakota’s Catie Tobin Female Athlete of the Year. She’s a three-time all-Summit League first team guard and twice named to the Summit’s all-tournament team.
Duffy is a three-time CoSIDA Academic All-American, one of five women’s basketball players to make the NCAA Division I first team in both 2019 and 2020. She’s also a three-time Academic All-Summit League honoree.
As a member of the Coyotes, Duffy led the team to two undefeated Summit League regular season titles, a Summit League Tournament title in 2020, a pair of NCAA Tournament berths and pair of Women’s National Invitation Tournament appearances. She is the only player in USD history with more than 1,700 points, 600 rebounds and 400 assists. Her 1,793 career points ranks third on South Dakota’s all-time charts.
