MANSFIELD, Mass. - Southern Connecticut State University senior Avery Fornaciari (Plymouth, Mass.) was named the Northeast 10 Conference Women's Swimming & Diving Sports Excellence Award winner, as announced by the NE10 on Wednesday, Apr. 22, 2020.

Fornaciari is the 11th Southern Connecticut student-athlete to win the NE10 Sports Excellence Award. Other recipients of the award include Men's Swimming & Diving's Miguel Nesrala (2010, 2012) and Daniel Elliott (2014), Women's Swimming & Diving's Amanda Burden (2010, 2011), Women's Outdoor Track & Field's Laura Brustolon (2010) and Men's Track & Field's Patrick Waszczak (2011), A.J. Guerra (2013), Logan Sharpe (2014) and Luke Velez (2018). 

The NE10 Sports Excellence Award is one of the conference's most prestigious. In order to be eligible, the student-athlete must receive the most votes of all Academic All-Conference selections for their respective sport. To be qualified for Academic All-Conference and Sport Excellence honors, a student-athlete must have started at least half or played in two-thirds of all contests while making significant contributions and maintaining a 3.3 GPA (on a 4.0 scale).

A 2019-20 CSCCA All-American as well as the NE10 Women's Swimmer of the Year, Fornaciari was named to the NE10 Academic All-Conference team after she won five events while leading the Owls to their third conference title in four years and their 13th all-time. Fornaciari also qualified for the 2019-20 NCAA Division II National Championship for the first time in her career in the 200 Yard Butterfly with a time of 2:03.31 at the conference championship. She also won the 100 Butterfly and 500 Freestyle championships while also winning the 400 Medley and 200 Medley Relay titles. She was also part of the 200 Freestyle Relay and 800 Freestyle Relay teams that finished second.