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Drury Athletics Program Ranks in Top 4% of Nation

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Drury University’s athletics program has ranked 11thin the nation--that’s according to the annual Learfield Directors Cup standings.  The ranking system takes into consideration 302 NCAA Division II programs nationwide.  KSMU’s Scott Butler has more.

These rankings show how well a university’s athletics compare to others across the country.  The rankings are based on a point system: each sport that makes the NCAA postseason will receive a certain amount of points, depending on their tournament results. 

The 2010-2011 is the second best in school history.  Drury finished ninth in 2007.

Pat Atwell is the director of athletics at Drury.

“The biggest thing here is we fund all sports really well.  The college is very supportive.  All our sports, from our major fan sports like basketball and baseball all the way to our sports that don’t have as much fans but still are important to us like cross-country, golf and tennis, all receive scholarship funding from the university so we can go out and get the kind of student-athletes that we want to have,” he said.

Atwell says that even with this accomplishment, as a group, Drury’s student-athletes have maintained an average 3.36 GPA.

For KSMU News, I’m Scott Butler.