Congrats to Taylor Lewan for being named to another All-America first team, this time AP. From mgoblue.com release:

University of Michigan football senior/junior offensive tackle Taylor Lewan (Scottsdale, Ariz./Chaparral) was named today (Tuesday, Dec. 11) to the 2012 Associated Press All-America first team.

Lewan continues to receive accolades for his play in 2012. The Big Ten Rimington-Pace Offensive Lineman of the Year and an All-Big Ten first team choice by the league's coaches and media, Lewan also was named to the All-America first team by the Walter Camp Football Foundation, ESPN.com and Athlon Sports and second team by CBSSports.com.

See this AP page for the full list.

Yes, it's been a long time but there's sufficient news to be shared to warrant another in this occasional series.

Let's begin with Men's Soccer where super-frosh Soony Saad is Michigan's first All-American since Michael Holody in 2008.  Saad was named a National Soccer Coaches Association of America (NSCAA) 2nd Team All-American.  Saad was also named to the All-Great Lakes region 1st team while senior Justin Meram was named to its 2nd team.

Justin Meram (L) and Soony Saad (R)

Saad, who finished second in the nation in goals with 19, broke U-M's seven-year-old single-season goals record and has also set new single-season records in points with 43 and shots with 143. Saad's 19 goals also led all freshmen nationally, and he is the only freshman to be ranked in the top five nationally in points and goals. He was also named TopDrawerSoccer.com Rookie of Year as well as All-Big Ten first team, Big Ten Freshman of the Year and Offensive Player of the Big Ten Tournament.

Meram closed his senior season on a nine-game scoring streak, the longest in program history, and scored U-M's lone goal in the College Cup semifinals against eventual national champion Akron. Meram played and started in 23 games, tallying 42 points on 17 goals and a team-leading eight assists. [His] 42 points, 17 goals and 104 shots in 2010 each rank second best in a single season all-time.

Meram is a two-time All-Big Ten second team selection and has earned Big Ten Offensive Player of the Week this season to go along with TopDrawerSoccer.com National Team of the Week and College Soccer News Player of the Week honors. He will be competing at the 2011 adidas MLS Player Combine, held Jan. 8-12 at Central Broward Regional Park in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Meram becomes the seventh Michigan player to participate in the MLS pre-draft combine and is looking to become U-M's fifth MLSuperDraft selection.

Soony Saad was also selected by USA U-20 National Team head coach Thomas Rongen as one of 24 players for its Dec 12-19 training camp now ongoing in Sunrise, Florida.  This training camp will include friendlies against Canada on Dec 16 and Dec 18. Saad is one of nine players making his first appearance in a USMNT U-20 camp.

Senior setter Lexi Zimmerman (2nd team) and junior outside hitter Alex Hunt (third team) of the volleyball team were both named to the American Volleyball Coaches Association (AVCA) 2010 All-America team. This is Zimmerman's third straight All-American honor and Hunt's first.

 

Alex Hunt

Zimmerman completes her career as the only Wolverine to earn three All-America awards, grabbing a second team laurel in 2008 and a first team distinction in 2009 before this year's selection to the second team. She led the Wolverines in assists (10.86) for the fourth straight season, ending her career as Michigan's all-time leader with 5,903, the sixth-best mark in Big Ten history. Zimmerman, the program leader in appearances at 140, also picked up All-Big Ten honors this season for the third consecutive year.

Hunt nabbed a spot on the third team for her first All-America award as a Wolverine. She led U-M and the conference in points (5.04) and kills (4.41). She is the only Big Ten player to average more than five points per set, using 503 kills, 45 service aces and 46 total blocks for 574.5 points. Hunt recorded 12 matches with at least 20 kills, including a 28-kill performance in a 3-2 win over No. 14 Minnesota on Sept. 25.

The duo's selection to the All-America team marks the second consecutive season that two Wolverines have earned national recognition. In 2009, outside hitter Juliana Paz (2008-09) earned third team honors in addition to Zimmerman's first team selection.

Full list here at the AVCA's official release.

Both the Men's Gymantics and Women's Gymnastics teams have been voted number one in their respective Big Ten preseason coaches' polls. 

[The defending NCAA champion men's gymnastics team returns] the 2010 Big Ten and NCAA all-around champion, senior Chris Cameron, and a pair of 2010 All-Americans, seniors Thomas Kelley and Ian Makowske. Leading the 11 member freshman class, [is] Sam Mikulak, national champion at the 2010 USA Gymnastics Championships.

The four-time defending Big Ten champion [women's gymnastics team returns] nine letterwinners, five All-Americans and three Big Ten champions to a program with more Big Ten team titles (18) than any other conference women's program in any sport.  [Five-time All-America senior Kylee Botterman], fifth-year senior Sarah Curtis, fifth-year senior Jordan Sexton and senior Trish Wilson captain a roster of gymnasts that have never lost at a Big Ten Championships.  All-Big Ten first team honorees Botterman and Curtis join defending Big Ten vault champion [and All-America sophomore Natalie Beilstein] looking to make a run at a 19th Big Ten title.

Go Blue!

Two announcements have come out today regarding Michigan baseball with the announcement of the National Collegiate Baseball Writers of America's Preseason All-American list and the location of the BigTen Tournament.

Picture by Chris Dzombak 

As far as the Preseason All-Americans, Michigan centerfielder Ryan LaMarre was named to the 3rd team of the All-American list. Last season, LaMarre his .344 with 55 runs, 11 doubles, 12 home runs, and 62 RBIs. LaMarre also performed well in the Cape Cod League, college baseball's most prestigious summer league, to help bolster his resume.

From MGoBlue:

"This is a great honor for Ryan with the success he has had in his first two seasons," commented head coach Rich Maloney. "He is a very gifted athlete who we are looking toward for big things this season in helping our team win and reach our goals."

Congratulations to Ryan and good luck next season.

In other news, the BigTen announced today that they will indeed play the next three BigTen Conference Baseball Tournaments in Columbus. This year's game will be held at Bill Davis Stadium, on the campus of Ohio State, and the 2011 and 2012 tournaments will be held at Huntington Park, home to the Columbus Clippers and site of last year's conference tournament, located just 3 miles from the OSU campus.

I'm not amused.

This is disappointing from a Michigan fan's perspective, but I'm sure it makes the most monetary sense. The BigTen tried to solicit bids from different communities with ballparks that would be suitable to host the tournament, and I can't imagine they received too many bids.

View Larger Map

That's 3.6 miles for those counting.

Columbus is the only BigTen team that is both in contention to play in the conference tournament year-in-and-year-out and has a ballpark that could offer a sizeable bid. East Lansing and Penn State aren't quite consistent enough to be guaranteed a spot in the tournament, which means they could end up hosting a tournament without any local support. The rest of the BigTen teams would have to host the tournament at their own facility, something that doesn't always mean profit.

So we're stuck with Columbus for the next three years.

Sigh… 65 days until baseball season.

Inspired by the pre-game trivia question today and the continued positive reaction to previous efforts, here's my newest (and probably last for a while as I have hit my seven created quizzes for the month limit.)

Michigan Consensus All-Americans in Football (all-time)

The previous efforts, in case you missed them:
Michigan Football Coaches since 1901

Michigan Starting Quarterbacks since 1969 (now corrected to make it primary quarterbacks)

Michigan Touchdown Leaders since 1949

NCAA Frozen Four Champions (all-time)

Rose Bowl winning teams since 1920

Have fun!

I thought I'd run down the All-American game rosters to compare teams total number of players in both the Army and Under Armour games. I thought maybe some other people would be interested in this too.

Top All-American Teams:

1. Texas - 12
2. USC - 10
3. Ohio State - 10
6. Georgia - 9
***5. Michigan - 8***
6. Florida - 8
7. Notre Dame - 7
8. Oklahoma - 6
9. North Carolina - 6
10. Miami (FL) - 6

* Alabama, Clemson, Florida State, and LSU all have 5

Here's the full list of schools who have recruits playing in either All-American game, in alphabetical order. The list works like this:
School - (Total # of All-Americans) # of Army/# of Under Armour

Alabama - (5) 4/1
Arkansas - (1) 1/0
Arizona State - (1) 1/0
Cal - (3) 1/2
Clemson - (5) 3/2
Florida - (8) 4/4
Florida State - (5) 1/4
Georgia - (9) 3/6
Illinois - (3) 2/1
Iowa - (1) 0/1
LSU - (5) 2/3
Maryland - (1) 0/1
Miami(FL) - (6) 2/4
*****Michigan - (8) 5/3*****
Michigan State - (2) 2/0
Minnesota - (2) 0/2
Mississippi State - (2) 1/1
Missouri - (1) 1/0
North Carolina - (6) 5/1
Notre Dame - (7) 6/1
Ohio State - (10) 5/5
Oklahoma - (6) 3/3
Oklahoma State - (1) 1/0
Oregon - (1) 1/0
Penn State - (3) 1/2
Rutgers - (1) 1/0
South Carolina - (3) 0/3
South Florida - (2) 0/2
Stanford - (4) 1/3
Tennessee - (1) 1/0
Texas - (12) 7/5
Texas A&M - (1) 1/0
UCLA - (3) 0/3
USC - (10) 6/4
Virginia Tech - (1) 1/0
Wake Forest - (1) 0/1
West Virginia - (2) 1/1

So what does this all mean? Nothing we didn't know already really. Getting Will Campbell obviously helped us out alot. It's good to see with all the decommits we still rank among the top classes. If we had kept Newsome/Beaver/Mcneal we'd have an elite class. Hopefully we can fill those spots in with some high quality recruits and end up somewhere in or near the top 5 classes. North Carolina really surprised me here, especially once they picked up Brennan Williams during the game. Texas dominated everyone but there could possibly be a slight bias to Texas high-schoolers selected for this game seeing as the game is played in San Antonio. Florida nabbed two commits during the game, placing them near the top of the list.

All-Americans by conference:

SEC - 34
Big Ten - 29
ACC - 25
Pac-10 - 22 (10 from USC)
Big 12 - 21 (18 combined from Texas and Oklahoma)

..this is sad for the Big East more than anything else...

I-A Independents (Notre Dame) - 7
Big East - 5

So some unbalance in the Pac-10 and ridiculous amount in the Big 12. These numbers give hope to the Big Ten coming back soon, and point to a possible demise of the Big East. All in all, 14 different schools have as many or more all-americans than the entire Big East (including us!).

Important to remember that players don't have to attend an All-American game or even perform well in that game to be good in college.

You really have to be proud of Rodriguez and our recruiting class right now. Just trying to keep hopes up for next year :)

Update - 1/5/09:
-Added 6 commits from UA game, updating top ten and conference totals

Notes:
-This list is derived from rosters on Rivals.com, from these links:
-http://footballrecruiting.rivals.com/content.asp?SID=880&CID=866621
-http://footballrecruiting.rivals.com/content.asp?SID=880&CID=893928
-Updated the list during the Army game with the recruits who committed during the broadcast, plan to update tomorrow after Under Armour game as well