Wartburg senior softball player Cari Kinzenbaw of Ladora is the only woman from the Iowa conference to win an N-C-A-A spring postgraduate scholarship. Kinzenbaw is an engineering science major with a 4.0 grade-point average. She graduated in May and has been accepted into Iowa State University’s engineering graduate studies program. She helped lead the Knights softball squad to a school-record 40 wins, the program’s second Iowa Conference championship and regional runner-up honors this year.

Wartburg athletic director Rick Willis says there’s no question the postgraduate scholarship is very prestigious and is the epitome of the combination of great academics and athletic achievement. Willis says it’s a tough scholarship to win. He says it’s a competitive process that requires letters of support form across campus and there’s stringent competition from all across the nation.

Willis says the award shows how you can be a “student athlete.” Willis says it’s important for people to realize that being a great athlete and a great student aren’t mutually exclusive.

Willis says it takes someone with special skills to play a sport and still finish at the very top of the academic ladder. He says the most important thing is having great time management skills. Willis says there are a lot of talented athletes that are very bright, but might not achieve as much because they don’t have the ability to manage their time.

Kinzenbaw is one of 29 women nationwide to receive the scholarship of 75-hundred dollars. Winners must have an overall grade-point average of three-point-two, distinguished performance in the sport, and behavior on and off the field that brings credit to the student, the institution and intercollegiate athletics.