University of Alabama All-American gymnast Stephanie Kite was awarded an NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship the association announced recently.

Kite, who holds a 4.0 grade point average in international marketing, is the 10th Crimson Tide gymnast to earn the award since 1983. Alabama's total leads all gymnastics programs by a large margin. Kite's honor comes one year after Tide All-American Kristin Sterner earned the scholarship, marking the third time Alabama has had back-to-back honorees.

"This is a great, and well deserved honor for Stephanie," assistant head coach David Patterson said. "Stephanie has certainly made the most of her student-athlete experience, excelling in all areas. We are very pleased to see her name added to the long list of Alabama gymnasts who have earned this prestigious honor."

The NCAA awarded 58 postgraduate scholarships of $7,500 each to 29 men and 29 women who participated in winter sports, which includes 22 NCAA sports.

To qualify for an NCAA postgraduate scholarship, a student-athlete must have an overall grade-point average of 3.200 (on a 4.000 scale) or its equivalent, must have performed with distinction as a member of the varsity team in the sport in which the student-athlete was nominated and must have behaved, both on and off the field, in a manner that has brought credit to the student-athlete, the institution and intercollegiate athletics.

Kite is a four-year NACGC/W Scholastic All-American and was named to the SEC Good Works Team this season. She earned Delta Sigma Pi's Scholarship Key and the School of Commerce and Business Administration Scholar/Athlete Award this year.

As a junior the Austin, Texas native earned the Dow Chemical Undergraduate Award, which denotes the business school's top junior. In addition to earning All-American honors on the floor exercise in 2003, she was also named to the CoSIDA Academic All-American At-Large team. She competed on Alabama's 2002 NCAA Championship and 2003 SEC Championship squads. Kite earned Academic All-SEC three times (freshmen are not eligible) and has been inducted into ODK and Gamma Beta Sigma honor societies.

In addition to Kite, the 10 NCAA Postgraduate scholarship winners for the Tide include: Julie Garrett, 1983; Barbara Mack, 1985; Julie Estin, 1987; Kelly Good, 1989; Katherine Kelleher, 1992; Dana Dobransky, 1993; Meredith Willard, 1997; Merritt Booth, 1998; Kristin Sterner, 2003.

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