Coyotes’ Haas earns academic honor

Cal State Dominguez Hills baseball player Jon Alia and Cal State San Bernardino volleyball standout Meghan Haas were named 2009 CCAA Male and Female Scholar-Athletes of the Year.

The honors were announced Monday in conjunction with the CCAA Executive Council Meetings in Seaside and voted on by faculty athletic representatives from the 11 conference schools.

Haas is the third San Bernardino student-athlete to win the award since its inception in 1989-90. The others were soccer player Tara Fontana in 1997-98 and Amy Pope Schumacher, a volleyball setter, in 2001-02.

The senior from Menifee helped the Coyotes (30-4) to an NCAA Division II national runner-up finish and emerged as the most prolific libero in school history. Last season she had 519 digs (4.68 per set). She also set a career record for digs in just three seasons (1,566) and holds four of the top five performances all-time in single-match digs (highest was 37, No. 2 on the list), as well as the top three single-season dig marks, topped by 554 digs in 2006.

She earned first-team All-CCAA and All-West Region honors and was named a third-team Daktronics All-American and an honorable mention All-American by the American Volleyball Coaches Association.

She is a two-time winner of the Dr. Hal Charnofsky Award and CCAA All-Academic selection. Among her other honors, Haas was named to the ESPN The Magazine/CoSIDA All-District VIII first team.

Haas also served four years on the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), where she participated in such events as Race for the Cure, Relay for Life, Disability Sports Festival, Read Across America, and PossAbilities Triathlon (benefitting the disabled community).

Alia, a senior first baseman for the Toros, was the eighth-leading hitter in NCAA Division II with a school-record batting average of .467. He ranked third in the nation with 98 hits and set single-season school records with 20 home runs, 78 RBIs, 25 doubles, 187 total bases and an .890 slugging percentage.

Alia was the CCAA Most Valuable Player, first-team All-CCAA, West Region Player of the Year, first-team All-West Region and first- team All-American.

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