George Washington University Athletics
Rizzotti Inducted Into CoSIDA Academic All-America Hall of Fame
6/14/2016 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
 |  | Follow @GW_WBB |
June 14, 2016
DALLAS -- George Washington women's basketball head coach Jennifer Rizzotti was one of five former collegiate scholar-athletes inducted into the Collegiate Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) Academic All-America Hall of Fame on Monday evening as part of CoSIDA's annual convention at the Hilton Anatole.
Created in 1988, the CoSIDA Academic All-America Hall of Fame recognizes Academic All-Americans who received their college diploma at least 10 years ago, have achieved lifetime success in their professional careers and are committed to philanthropic causes.
Joining Rizzotti in the Class of 2016 were former Purdue University quarterback and 2009 Super Bowl MVP Drew Brees; former Notre Dame baseball standout, noted surgeon and international humanitarian Dr. Angelo Capozzi; former TCU men's basketball star and former Harvard Business School professor Dr. James I. Cash, Jr.; and former Iowa State men's basketball standout and current head coach of the Chicago Bulls Fred Hoiberg.
The five new inductees join 137 members of the elite Academic All-America Hall of Fame. Monday evening's induction ceremony featured ESPN's Rece Davis as emcee and legendary broadcaster Dick Enberg, the ambassador of the Academic All-America program, as special guest and presenter. In addition, the 2016 Dick Enberg Award recipient, Pro Football Hall of Famer Roger Staubach, was also recognized.
As a student-athlete at the University of Connecticut, Rizzotti was a two-time Academic All-American and the 1996 Academic All-American of the Year for women's basketball.
"My parents taught me at a young age to try to be the best at everything that I could," Rizzotti said. "I grew up with a brother who was 11 months older than me ... I was always playing with the boys. My parents encouraged me to play everything; they never held me back, they never told me I couldn't do anything because I was a girl. I grew up in a great environment with my dad as the neighborhood quarterback and the neighborhood pitcher, but it was studies first. We were never allowed to do sports unless we were done with schoolwork."
Rizzotti first vaulted into the national spotlight as the starting point guard for the Huskies' first national championship team in 1995 with an undefeated 35-0 record. A two-time All-American and the Most Outstanding Player of the 1995 and 1996 NCAA Regionals, Rizzotti virtually swept the postseason awards her senior season as Big East Player of the Year, Big East Scholar-Athlete of the Year, Associated Press Player of the Year, Honda Cup Collegiate Woman Athlete of the Year and the Wade Trophy winner. She graduated as UConn's career leader in assists (637) and steals (349) and still ranks second all-time in those categories.
"Not a day goes by that I don't use what I learned at the University of Connecticut in my life, whether it was taking the basketball skill to a professional career or the attention to detail and the drive to be successful as a coach in my coaching career," said Rizzotti. "I couldn't be more thankful to Geno Auriemma for giving me the opportunity to build a foundation for the rest of my life, and a big part of that was being a student-athlete. My parents gave me the drive to want to be good at everything I did and I'm certainly grateful for that, but I learned about time management and about setting priorities and about wanting to be the best in my four years at the University of Connecticut, and I'm certainly grateful that I'm now in a career where I have the opportunity to give those same lessons back."
Rizzotti played eight seasons of professional basketball following her graduation from UConn in 1996. In addition to five seasons in the WNBA, she competed for three seasons with the New England Blizzard in the American Basketball League and was a two-time all-star.
Rizzotti was hired as head coach at the University of Hartford in 1999 and turned the Hawks into a powerhouse in the America East Conference. In her 17 seasons at Hartford, she compiled a record of 316-200 (.612), including 183-96 (.656) in America East play, winning five conference championships and four regular-season titles and guiding the Hawks to five NCAA Tournament appearances and a pair of first-round wins. A three-time America East Coach of the Year, Rizzotti was a finalist for the Kay Yow National Coach of the Year award following the 2009-10 season after leading Hartford to a 20-game winning streak and the program's first-ever national ranking. Moreover, her teams were recognized on the Women's Basketball Coaches Association's Academic Top 25 on three occasions.
"When I got to the University of Hartford ... 17 years ago I had to change the culture," Rizzotti said. "I had to make sure these girls understood that there's such a small percentage of us who actually do get a chance to play professionally, so what are you doing to prepare yourself for life after college? It's not necessarily about the grades and what you major in, it's about the preparation and the accountability. We started right from that day to recruit kids that made academics a priority because it always translated into basketball, it always translated into being on time, into being unselfish and what it meant to be a good teammate. I just think that making academics a priority transcends everything else you do in life, and I've been I've been fortunate enough to have been given opportunities to give that back to the young women that pass through every four years.
"One of the biggest reasons (I took the job at GW) was having the opportunity to work with very high-level student-athletes that understand the importance of an education and what it can do to further their lives," she continued. "It's a pleasure for me to have the opportunity to work for (Director of Athletics and Recreation) Patrick Nero in the Atlantic 10 with these wonderful young women, and I look forward to making a positive impact on their lives, and hopefully 20 years from now when one of them is getting the opportunity to be inducted into something like this they'll look back on their career and getting to play for me the same way I look back on mine."
Inducted into the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame in 2013, Rizzotti is also involved with the USA Women's Basketball national program. She served as head coach of the 2010 FIBA Americas U18 gold medal winners as well as the 2011 U19 world champions. In 2011 she was crowned USA Basketball National Coach of the Year, and more recently Rizzotti served as an assistant for the 2014 FIBA World Championships. In addition, she is part of the USA Basketball Women's National Team's staff in preparation for the 2016 Olympic Games.
