Full Centennial Conference Release            

Past Garnet NCAA Woman of the Year Nominees

LANCASTER, Pa. – A pair of 2020 Swarthmore College graduates, Emma Morgan-Bennett and Mehra den Braven, were selected as the Centennial Conference nominees for the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year award, announced by the conference on Friday. The Centennial nominees for the NCAA Woman of the Year are selected by the conference Senior Woman Administrators.
 
The duo from the volleyball team were chosen from a group of 10 candidates submitted by the Centennial Conference's member institutions. Morgan-Bennett and den Braven are the eighth and ninth Garnet student-athletes to receive the nomination for the NCAA Woman of the Year from the Centennial. The pair joins the illustrious list of Caitlin Mularkey (2009), Katie Lytle (2014), Aarti Rao (2014), Supriya Davis (2015), Tess Wei (2017), Sarah Wallace (2018) and Marin McCoy (2019). In 2001, Kristen English represented the Garnet as the Pennsylvania nominee. The nine selections from Swarthmore to represent the Centennial Conference is the most by any school in the conference.
 
Morgan-Bennett, a New York City native, excelled both on the court and in the classroom. She was recently named a 2020 Marshall Scholar, one of just 46 students from the United States to receive the prestigious honor. Marshall Scholars are invited to pursue graduate studies in the United Kingdom, where Morgan-Bennett will pursue a master of arts degree in screen documentary from Goldsmiths, University of London in 2020 and then continue to pursue a doctorate in social policy and intervention from Oxford University.
 
She was a member of the 2019 Philadelphia Inquirer Academic All-Area Team, two-time Academic All-Centennial Team (2018 & 2019), and three-time CC Academic Honor Roll (2017, 2018, 2019). The middle blocker earned American Volleyball Coaches Association All-America (AVCA) Honorable Mention honors in 2018. She is a two-time AVCA All-Region pick (2018, 2019) and two-time All-Centennial Second Team selection (2018, 2019). She finished her career ranked second all-time in blocks (318) and assist blocks (238) and fourth all-time with 80 solo blocks.

In the community, Morgan-Bennett was also a leader on campus and the Swarthmore community. She founded Athletics for Diversity and Inclusion (ADI), a campus-wide coalition that centralizes conversations surrounding athletes' identities. This coalition hosts two representatives from every team on campus and organizes campus-wide events, educational programs, and community service throughout the year. With help from ADI, she was awarded Swarthmore's William J. Cooper Foundation Grant, which supports topical events featuring eminent guests in their fields of expertise. Morgan-Bennett helped spearhead an event titled "Beyond The Field: Activism, Athletics, and Empowerment in the Modern Political Era," a teach-in that occurred in February 2020 and featured former Eagles' Super Bowl champion, All-Pro, and anti-incarceration activist, Malcolm Jenkins. Through student-panels and a moderated conversation with Jenkins that drew over 600 students and community members, Swarthmore engaged in an examination of the intersections between political dissent and athletic capital. As the Co-founder and Executive Director of Eat at the Table Theatre Company (E.A.T.T.), she created a youth theater company for young actors of color to explore and celebrate race through repurposed and original theater pieces. Additional exploits of Morgan-Bennett include serving on Swarthmore President Valerie Smith's hiring committee for its Title IX coordinator, participating as a keynote panelist at the NCAA Convention on the topic of NCAA's Advocates of Change: Student-Athlete Activism and Expression in the 21st Century, and working as a summer research intern for the National Advocates for Pregnant Women (NAPW).  

Den Braven, a Santa Clara, Calif. Native, received numerous academic awards throughout her career, including a three-time recognition as a CoSIDA Academic All-District honoree and named to the Philadelphia Inquirer Academic All-Area Team three-times, including a Performer of the Year honor in 2017. Den Braven was named third team CoSIDA Academic All-America in 2017.
 
On the court, den Braven was a two-time AVCA All-America Honorable Mention honoree. All four-years, the outside hitter was named to the All-Centennial team, landing on the first team twice (2017 & 2018) and second team twice (2016 & 2019). She ranks fifth all-time in Swarthmore history with 1,112 career kills and sixth with 3,209  attack attempts.
 
Outside the classroom and off the court, den Braven was an active member in the community contributing on the Swarthmore campus, as well as the surrounding community. At SCI Chester, a local medium-security prison, she facilitated community workshops and devised projects with incarcerated and nonincarcerated individuals. At CADES, a nonprofit dedicated to improving the lives of children and adults with intellectual & physical disabilities, she assisted children with completing art projects. At Pathways PA, she volunteered to provide tax help to low-income households, conducting interviews and completing tax returns. Experience with these community-based initiatives has led her to take up the position of Reentry Housing AmeriCorps VISTA in Philadelphia to support the community-led initiatives creating a better pathway home for individuals. Den Braven also worked as a behavioral economics research assistant with a professor at Swarthmore. In this role, she coordinated and guided four other students and collaborated with local policymakers to evaluate initiatives focused on the needs of city residents. 
 
The NCAA Woman of the Year award focuses on four pillars: academics, athletics, service and leadership. The 2020 award was comprised of 605 nominees, the most ever in the 30-year history of the Woman of the Year program.  Morgan-Bennett and den Braven are two of the 220 nominees selected from NCAA Division III.
 
To be eligible, a nominee must have competed and earned a varsity letter in an NCAA-sponsored sport, must have completed eligibility in her primary sport, and must have earned her undergraduate degree by Summer 2020. The NCAA Woman of the Year selection committee identifies the Top 30 – 10 from each division – and from there selects three finalists from each division. The top 30 honorees will be announced in September, and the 2020 NCAA Woman of the Year will be announced later in the fall.