The College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) named Northern Arizona University senior distance runner Tyler Day the Men’s Division I Track and Field and Cross Country Academic All-American of the Year this week, headlining the nation’s top scholar-athletes in the sport. Teammate Geordie Beamish joined Day on the All-America First Team.
The Academic All-American of the Year honor capped off Day’s successful collegiate career, which included becoming the first NAU men’s athlete to earn Division I National Men’s Track Athlete of the Year honors. He received All-American distinction in both the 3K and 5K following the cancellation of the NCAA Indoor Track and Field Championships.
Day graduated in May with a 3.76 grade point average, a degree in journalism and a long list of athletic achievements.
Starting in January, he broke the American collegiate record in the 5K at the BU John Thomas Terrier Classic, clocking a time of 13:16.95 and ranks No. 3 all-time on the collegiate performance list for the 5K. Later in the season, he ran a personal-best time of 7:45.70 in the 3K placing him No. 3 in the nation and No. 12 all-time in the collegiate top 15.
He also ran the anchor leg of NAU’s Big Sky championship meet on the distance medley relay team and earned a spot on the Watch List for The Bowerman, an award presented annually to the most outstanding male and female track and field athletes in the country.
Listen to Day talk to NAU-TV about his academic and collegiate career.
With this recent honor, Day became the third Lumberjack student-athlete, joining alumni track and field and cross country runner David McNeill and soccer player Kristi Andreassen, selected as the Academic All-American of the Year in their respective sport. Both McNeill and Andreassen, who received their honors during the 2009-10 and 2010-11 academic years, respectively, were inducted into the NAU Athletics Hall of Fame.
Both Day and Beamish were previously voted to the Academic All-District 8 First Team last month and earned their second career Academic All-American honors. Day earned Second Team honors in 2017 and Beamish was a Second Team honoree last year.
Beamish graduated with a grade point average of 3.65 in civil engineering. His athletic career garnered him All-American honors during the indoor season in the mile and the 3K. He ranks No. 2 nationally in the 3K with a time of 7:44.67 and No. 4 nationally in the mile with a time of 3.56.90. Beamish posted his personal-best mile time in the historic Wanamaker Mile at the 113th NYRR Millrose Games. He collected his third All-American cross-country finish, placing No. 37 at the NCAA Championships while helping the Lumberjacks earn a second-place team finish.
Day and Beamish are the 11th and 12th NAU student-athletes all-time to receive multiple Academic All-American honors. To date, this is the first time in school history that NAU has produced three First Team honorees in the same academic year and the first time the department has had four Academic All-Americans in a Year. Men’s basketball player Brooks DeBisschop earned a First Team honor and women’s volleyball player Abby Stomp earned a Third Team to round out NAU’s Academic All-American honors.