Times-Dispatch/Sports Backers Scholar-Athlete Program ups award amount to $60,000;
Teams of the Year and Comeback Athletes also to be recognized

The Richmond Region’s finest high school will be on display and rewarded for their hard work on Monday night, June 8 when the 18th Annual Times-Dispatch/Sports Backers Scholar-Athlete Awards Dinner takes place at The Jefferson Hotel. This year the program is awarding $60,000 in college scholarships to 20 outstanding high school student-athletes, as well as awards to the male and female Comeback Athletes of the Year and Team of the Year awards.

Twenty youngsters, 10 boys and 10 girls, all seniors, have been selected as scholarship finalists from the Richmond region. The overall winning boy’s and girl’s scholarships will be $7,500 each, with the runner-ups receiving $4,000 each, and the rest of the finalists $2,000 each.

University of Richmond Football Coach Mike London, who guided the Spiders to the 2008 NCAA Football Subdivision National Championship, will be the featured speaker at the event, which gets underway at 6:30 p.m. Coach London will speak at 8 p.m. and awards will be handed out at approximately 8:30 p.m. For ticket information call Faith Hecht at the Sports Backers 804-285-9495 x250 or email at faith@sportsbackers.org.

The finalists will attend the dinner not knowing who are the male and female Scholar-Athletes of the Year. The two winners will each receive a $7,500 scholarship. A male and female runner-up will receive $4,000 each, while the remaining finalists will each receive a $2,000 grant. Finalists were chosen from a pool that includes one male and one female nominee from each high school within the Times-Dispatch's primary circulation area. Nominees and finalists will be profiled in the Sunday, June 7 edition of the Times-Dispatch.

The finalists for the 2009 Times-Dispatch/Sports Backers Scholar-Athlete of the Year are:

Girls			Boys
Kristin Carpenter	Hanover		Matthew Armentrout	Deep Run
Emma DeJarnette	Atlee		Nick Austin	James River
Michelle Foley	Godwin		Will Bates	Thomas Dale
Paige Johnston	Midlothian		Ben DeJarnette	Atlee
Jenna Moye	Cosby		Stuart Ferguson	Collegiate
Madison Parrish	Thomas Dale		Jackson Freeman	St. Chrisotpher's
Susannah Piersol	Maggie Walker		Michael Green	Thomas Dale
Julie Robertson	Thomas Dale		Chris Smith	Clover Hill
Carter Stephens	Collegiate		Alec Ward	Douglas Freeman
Jenna Taylor	James River		Christopher Wheeler	Highland Springs

This is the eighteenth year of the program, which has now awarded a total of $480,000 to 335 outstanding student-athletes from the Richmond area.

A limited number of tickets for the Times-Dispatch/Sports Backers Scholar-Athlete Awards Dinner are available for $100 each and may be ordered by calling the Sports Backers at (804) 285-9495. The deadline to order tickets is Friday, May 29 or when the event sells out, whichever comes first.

The Sports Backers are also presenting boys and girls Team of the Year awards, sponsored by Williams Mullen.

CJW Sports Medicine will present its male and female Comeback Athletes of the Year at the banquet. Each winner receives a $1,000 scholarship, and the schools receive $500. The awards recognize high school athletes who have overcome major injuries or illnesses during their careers and returned to playing their sports.