The Belltower
Samford University
News
Sports
Snapshot
June 8, 2011
Cook And Towns Win Coleman Lew Leadership Awards
Samford soccer player Lauren Cook and football player Jeremy Towns were among the 25 Southern Conference student-athletes honored with the Coleman Lew Leadership Awards on Wednesday.
The awards were announced jointly by Coleman Lew & Associates, Inc., an international executive search firm, and the Southern Conference, the nation's fifth-oldest Division I conference.
The award recognizes student-athletes from each of the Southern Conference's 12 member institutions. Coaches, faculty athletic representatives and senior woman administrators nominate prospective candidates based on leadership, academic excellence and athletic achievement in both the college environment and the community. Athletic directors and representatives from Coleman Lew & Associates conducted one-on-one interviews with the finalists before determining the award winners.
Recipients will be recognized at the Southern Conference Honors Dinner on Wednesday, June 1 at the Charleston Marriott in Charleston, S.C.
Cook is a senior forward from Conyers, Ga. She was on the Dean's List at Samford in Fall 2009, Spring 2010 and Fall 2010 as a family studies major. She has been named to the SoCon's Fall Academic All-Conference team for the last two years, and she was named to the SoCon Honor Roll in 2009-10. Cook was named to Samford's chapter of the Chi Alpha Sigma College Athlete Honor Society in the Spring of 2011.
As a junior in 2010, Cook served as a team captain for the Bulldogs, and she will be a captain again this fall. As a junior, she led the team in assists with five. As a freshman in 2007, Cook was named to the Ohio Valley Conference's All-Newcomer Team after scoring a career-high nine goals, including three game-winning goals.
Towns, a junior defensive lineman from Dolomite, Ala., served on the NCAA Recertification Team's Gender Diversity Committee at Samford. He also served as a volunteer mentor at the G. Ross Bell Detention Center, and he participated in the March of Dimes' March for Babies in 2009. Towns has also served as a member of Samford's Student-Athlete Advisory Committee and the school's chapter of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes.
Towns has been a leader on campus since his first year at Samford, earning the Samford Male Freshman Leadership Award in the spring of 2009. Academically, he has been named to the Southern Conference's Academic All-Conference team, and he was selected as a Samford Student Ambassador in 2010. Towns has made the Dean's List at Samford for every semester since arriving on campus. On the field, Towns is returning this season from an injury. He had a strong spring season and looks to compete for a starting spot on the team's defensive line.
