It’s official: University of Wisconsin volleyball’s graduating senior Lauren Carlini won the AAU James E. Sullivan Award Tuesday night in New York. The award is given to the most outstanding amateur athlete who also demonstrated premier leadership, character and sportsmanship, and Carlini is UW’s first ever recipient of the prestigious honor.
Carlini won the award in front of six other finalists: Kayla Harrison for judo, Laurie Hernandez for gymnastics, Ashleigh Johnson for water polo, Kyle Snyder for wrestling, Aly Raisman for gymnastics and Ginny Thrasher for target shooting. While this year’s nominees are from relatively nonmainstream sports, the list of former winners includes former stars like Peyton Manning and Tim Tebow.