Ohio Northern junior Grace Honigford (West Chester/Lakota East) and seniors Isabella Orofino (Powell/Olentangy Liberty) and Jessica Tubbs (Maumee/Springfield) were named All-American Scholars for the 2022-23 season by the Women's Golf Coaches Association.
Honigford, Orofino and Tubbs were among 1,401 women's collegiate golfers from 378 programs across the country recognized with this prestigious honor.
The criteria for selection to the All-American Scholar Team are some of the most stringent in all of college athletics and include having an overall cumulative grade point average of 3.50 or higher, being an amateur and on the team's roster through the conclusion of the team's season, and playing in 50% of the college's regularly scheduled competitive rounds during the year through the team's conference championship.
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A 2022-23 College Sports Communicators All-America At-Large Second Team honoree, Honigford led the way for ONU all season, capping her year with a runner-up finish at the Ohio Athletic Conference Championships for her third career All-OAC accolade. She shot a 313 at the OACs to break the school's 72-hole record of 325, set by Meagan Brennan in 2007, by 12 strokes. That was after she had already broken her own school record for 54 holes with a 231. The mechanical engineering major has finished in the top two at the OAC Championships in all three of her seasons at ONU, as she was the 2021 tournament champion and was co-champion in 2022.
Honigford closed the season as a three-time Medalist with a team-best 78.8 average for 18 holes through 20 rounds of play, matching her single-season program record from 2021-22. She competed in 10 events and posted eight top-four finishes, shooting a season-best 73 at the Bluffton Spring Classic. A four-time OAC Golfer of the Week in 2022-23, Honigford earned Medalist honors at the Bluffton Fall Classic, DePauw (Ind.) Invitational and Bluffton Spring Classic and was a WGCA All-Great Lakes Region honoree. She was also part of the ONU lineup that set record-low team scores for 18, 36, 54 and 72 holes.
In her three seasons at ONU, Honigford is a two-time WGCA All-America Scholar and 10-time OAC Golfer of the Week selection with 32 top-10 finishes, including 15 Medalist honors, in 35 career tournaments with an average score of 78.9 over 59 rounds of play.
A nursing major, Orofino joined Honigford as an All-OAC honoree this season, placing 11th at the OAC Championships. Now a three-time WGCA All-America Scholar and Academic All-OAC honoree, she ranked fifth on the team in season average with an 87.0 over 16 rounds and was part of the quartet that set school records for 18, 54 and 72 holes. She had two top-10 finishes on the year and shot a season-best 78 in the Bluffton Spring Classic to match her career-low score from the 2021-22 season.
A CSC Academic All-District At-Large Team honoree this season, Orofino has an 86.4 average over 47 rounds and 14 career top-10 finishes in four seasons at ONU.
Tubbs joined Honigford and Orofino in earning Academic All-OAC recognition this season. The accounting and statistics major is now a three-time WGCA All-America Scholar and Academic All-OAC honoree. In 2022-23, she posted an average score of 91.5 over 11 rounds of play with an 18-hole low of 82 to match her career-best from her freshman and junior seasons.
In four years at ONU, Tubbs has posted an average score of 93.2 over 35.5 rounds.
The Polar Bears posted a 78-12 record and finished as the runner-up in the OAC in 2022-23 under 10th-year head coach Chad Bucci.
