WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. – After becoming one of five players in the Lycoming College women's basketball team's history to earn three all-conference accolades in her career, senior Erica Lutz (Bernville, Pa./Hamburg) was recognized as Lycoming College's NCAA Woman of the Year nominee on Thursday, July 15, as the NCAA announced all of the nominees for the prestigious award.
 
Lutz is the fourth Lycoming basketball player to be nominated, joining Julia Antonelli '13 and Nicole Calella '17 and Kayla Kline '20.
 
A 6-0 forward, Lutz was Lycoming's first D3hoops.com All-Region selection as a senior, earning Second Team All-Atlantic/Mid-Atlantic Region honors. The ecology major was also named Lycoming College's Most Outstanding Female Athlete.
 
An Academic All-MAC and First Team All-MAC Freedom selection this year, Lutz became the first Warrior in program history to lead the conference in both scoring (16.2) and rebounding (11.3) in the same year and she joined LeVan (18.8, 2001), Kaitlyn Ober (14.6, 2011) and Shelby Mueller (15.0, 2018) as conference scoring leaders. She also finished second in the league in field goal percentage (.527), sixth in free throw percentage (.760) and blocked shots (1.2) and seventh in assists (2.5). She finished the season 18th in Division III in rebounding (11.3) and 90th in points per game.
 
During the season, the senior led the Warriors in scoring and rebounding in all six games, posting four double-doubles.
 
Lutz finished her career with 901 points, crossing the 900-point plateau with her last bucket of the season against Stevenson on March 18. The 6-0 forward became the fourth player in program history to reach 25 career double-doubles and also finished her career with a program-best .527 field goal percentage (382-of-729), second in program history with 138 blocked shots and sixth with 671 rebounds.
 
Off the court, the ecology major volunteered with general maintenance of houses and barn, river clean up after flooding and grass and tree cutting at the Lycoming Biology Field Station. She also assisted in dove bandings, baited areas and set up duck traps for banding with the Pennsylvania State Game Commission. She also volunteered with the women's basketball team at St. Mark's Lutheran Church and with a variety of events for the Lycoming County SPCA.
 
She was an eight-time member of the Dean's List and four-time member of the MAC Academic Honor Roll and was inducted into the Chi Alpha Sigma Athletics Honor Society in 2020.
 
Established in 1991, the NCAA Woman of the Year award recognizes graduating female college athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves in academics, athletics, service and leadership throughout their collegiate careers.
 
The NCAA encourages member schools to honor their top graduating female student-athletes each year by submitting their names for consideration for the Woman of the Year award.
 
Next, conferences will select up to two nominees each from the pool of school nominees. Then, the Woman of the Year selection committee, made up of representatives from the NCAA membership, will choose the Top 30 honorees — 10 from each division.
 
The selection committee will determine the top three honorees from each division from the Top 30 and announce the nine finalists in the fall. From those nine finalists, the NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics then will choose the 2021 NCAA Woman of the Year.