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Corn Flakes - Sarah Pavan - Best Student Athlete. Ever?

By Jon Johnston

Sarah Pavan proved she isn't done with the spotlight as she was chosen as the 2007-08 ESPN The Magazine Academic All-America® of the Year. She was selected by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) for the second consecutive year, becoming the first athlete to win the award twice. Her list of athletic accomplishments is long and impressive:

A native of Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, Pavan was named as a first-team All-American by the AVCA four years in a row, becoming just the fourth Division I volleyball player in NCAA history to receive that distinction.  She was also honored as the ESPN the Magazine Academic All-American of the Year for volleyball as a junior and senior. In addition, she was named as The Big 12 Conference Female Athlete of the Year the last two seasons. A three-time pick as first team Academic All-America®, she won the Honda-Broderick Cup in June of 2007 and was a three-time Big 12 Volleyball Player of the Year.

Sarah Pavan won a national title for Nebraska and finished her academic career with a 4.0 in biochemistry. You can't get much closer to perfection than that. You could easily argue she's the best athlete to ever come out of the University.

Pavan's accomplishments stand in stark contrast with the two Nebraska wrestlers dismissed for having been compensated to appear nude on a porn site. That's a lot of hurting on a program that's worked hard to become one of the best in the Big 12 only to have it shot down by selfish acts of utter stupidity.

In the 'now for something completely different' category, ESPN's Tim Griffin has some nice things to say about 'A Sea of Red' and that other Maple Street Press yearbook put out by someone from Texas. (Ha!)

The 112-page magazine is edited by Jon Johnson and features such thought-provoking articles as "Nebraska's walk-on program - fantasy, reality, practicality," and "Why Callahan Failed: Arrogance, NFL Methods & Cultural Misunderstanding led to Demise at NU." It also features an intriguing study of the Cornhusker offense penned by veteran Lincoln Journal-Star columnist Steve Sipple, who has as good a handle on the Nebraska program as anybody around.

Well, except for that 'Johnson' reference. If I had a buck for every time I've been called 'Johnson', I'd be pretty darned rich. In fact, I wrote for a monthly publication years ago that took six months to get my name spelled right. Maybe this is why people generally call me something else besides my name?

Brandon Vogel talks about other programs that could be considered 'Friends of Nebraska' - those programs for whom you have respect. I'd have to agree with him on Wisconsin because of the Alvarez connection. Beer and cheese aren't bad reasons either.

I have not posted a lot of links to Husker football this week because... well, because they're always glowing goodness this time of year, and the idea that college football season is only a couple of weeks away hasn't truly hit me yet.

  I'm off with a group of Cub Scouts this weekend. Always interesting watching kids experience the outdoors for the first time. Hopefully there will be no surprises for Husker fans over the weekend because this time of year those surprises are always bad.

All y'all have a good last weekend of no college football. Relief is on the way soon, or so I've been told!

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