Eastern Illinois softball posted a successful season on the field for the 2025 season as the Panthers won both the Ohio Valley Conference regular season and tournament titles to advance to the programs second NCAA Tournament appearance.
 
On Thursday (August 7), the Panthers were honored for their success in the classroom as EIU was one of ten teams ranked in the NFCA Easton Top 10 for NCAA Division I GPA for the 2024-25 academic year.
 
EIU finished in a tie for sixth in the nation posting a 3.740 GPA for the academic year, ending deadlocked with Western Kentucky.
 
Saint Louis was the national leader with a 3.910 GPA followed by Butler, Omaha, DePaul and Jacksonville in the top five.   Green Bay, Southern Illinois and Youngstown State followed EIU and WKU in the Top 10 rankings.
 
In addition, EIU had 18 players earn NFCA Scholar-Athlete Honors for the year with the list including -- Sophie Cerveny, Marybeth Dyson, Alisha Frederick, Bryanna French, Briana Gonzalez, Kendall Grover, Morgan Hance, Ava Hartman, Emily Konkel, Maddux Marshall, Mia Mazzola, Karlie McKenzie, Sophia Olman, McKenzie Oslanzi, Rylie Schipp, Hillary Springer, Jersey Summers and Jenna Teakert.  
 
To earn NFCA Easton Scholar-Athlete honors a student-athlete most have maintained a 3.5 or higher GPA for the 2024-25 academic year.  A total of 9,176 collegiate student-athletes earned the academic recognition with 2,554 coming from the NCAA Division I level.