DETROIT (6/28/2019) -- Another academic award was earned by University of Detroit Mercy senior attackman Matthew Vangalen as he was selected a USILA/Warrior and New Balance Division I Scholar All-American. 

He was one of three student-athletes from the MAAC to be selected for the accolade as he joined Mario Caito and Michael Sanzone from Canisius.

Vangalen is also just the third Titan to ever earn the academic distinction following Jordan Houtby in 2013 andPaul Bitetti in 2016. 

It was a year of recognition on and off the field for Vangalen as he was tabbed the MAAC's Offensive Player of the Year in May and was named to the Google Cloud Academic All-America® Division I Men's At-Large Third Team last week.

He graduated with 3.96 GPA in Accounting & Finance and finished a great career with Detroit Mercy, setting the school record for career assists with 77 and ending third in school history with 76 goals and second with 153 points. 

As a senior, he led the MAAC and was 13th in the country with 2.40 assists per game, while also finishing third in the conference and 51st in the nation with 3.67 points per game. He broke his own school record with 55 points in 2019 on another school record 36 assists to go with 19 goals. 

In 1989 the USILA Scholar All-America Program was established to recognize student-athletes from USILA member institutions who have distinguished themselves academically, athletically and as citizens of their communities. The USILA Selection Committee selects an overall team representing Division I, II and III.
 
A Scholar All-American must be nominated by his coach and be a student with a senior year academic standing and a cumulative grade point average of 3.0 (4.0 scale). He will have behaved in a manner that has brought credit to himself, his institution, and to college lacrosse both on and off the field. He must also be an All-American, a member of a North/South team, or an outstanding league or conference player.