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In November, 30 candidates for this season's Lowe's Senior CLASS Award were released. Now that list is down to 10 and voting began yesterday. Votes from the public count as 1/3 of the player's total score with the remaining 2/3 of the vote going to NCAA Division I coaches and media members. The voting results as they stand today are perhaps different than I would expect, with UC-Santa Barbara's Emilie Johnson scooping up nearly a quarter of all the votes cast to this point.
The Senior CLASS award, an acronym for Celebrating Loyalty and Achievement for Staying in School, will be handed out in Denver during the Final Four. Each student-athlete must be a senior and the voting criteria is based on four C's - community, classroom, character and competition. The award, which began in 2001-02 includes some star-studded past winners. Women who have been honored with this award include Maya Moore (Connecticut), Kelsey Griffin (Nebraska), Courtney Paris (Oklahoma), Candice Wiggins (Stanford), Allison Bales (Duke), Seimone Augustus (LSU), Kendra Wecker (Kansas State), Alana Beard (Duke), LaToya Thomas (Mississippi State) and Sue Bird (Connecticut).
Fan voting lasts through March 18 and votes can be cast for your three favorite seniors once each day until the deadline.
Current vote standings (as of Jan. 26):
- Emilie Johnson (UC-Santa Barbara) - 24.3%
- Brittany Rayburn (Purdue) - 18.8%
- Brittany Carter (Memphis) - 13.3%
- Denise Bevileau (New Hampshire) - 11.5%
- Michelle Kurowski (UMBC) - 10.2%
- Natalie Novosel (Notre Dame) - 6.6%
- Nnemkadi Ogwumike (Stanford) - 6.1%
- Justine Raterman (Dayton) - 3.3%
- Lauren Edwards (Princeton) - 3%
- Amanda Johnson (Oregon) - 2.9%
Click on each woman's name to see her bio on how she represents the four C's and don't forget to vote!