Makana Stone continues to reel in awards. (Photo by JohnsPhotos.net)
She’s still in the game.
Even though Coupeville’s Makana Stone graduated from Whitman College earlier this spring, her name keeps popping up every time an award is announced.
Earlier, the former Wolf was tabbed as the Northwest Conference women’s basketball MVP, won Whitman’s Mignon Borleske Award — the school’s highest athletic honor for a female athlete — and landed on the NWC All-Academic First Team.
Now, Stone has been nominated by Whitman for the big-time NCAA Woman of the Year Award.
She’s one of seven senior student/athletes across all sports honored by NWC officials.
The league’s senior female administrators will pare that list of seven down to one athlete, and announce their pick Tuesday, June 14.
Whether it’s Stone or a fellow athlete, the NWC selection enters the national competition, where the NCAA Woman of the Year selection committee picks a top 30, with 10 athletes apiece from D1, D2, and D3.
The committee then selects a top three for each division, with one athlete eventually emerging as the ultimate winner.
Angela Mercurio, a triple jumper from the University of Nebraska, won the award in 2019, while Canisius College distance runner Mary Beth Riley claimed the inaugural honor back in 1991.
Two basketball players (Rebecca Lobo – University of Connecticut – 1995, and Nkolika Anosike – University of Tennessee – 2008) have previously won the award.
The NCAA Woman of the Year recognizes “graduating female student-athletes who have exhausted their eligibility and distinguished themselves in academics, athletics, service, and leadership throughout their collegiate careers.”
Stone finished her four-year run at Whitman having made the most starts of any female basketball player to ever attend the Walla Walla school.
She and her fellow Blues seniors went to the NCAA tourney three times in four seasons, won a league title, and captured more wins than any group in program history.
When Stone wasn’t flying down the court, slapping layups high off the glass or rejecting rival shots, she was a standout in the classroom and the community.
Coupeville’s progeny was part of the Whitman College mentor program, an ACE representative, and a member of the Whitman Elementary School Science Night Committee.
