UW senior Danny Shelton on Saturday night. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)
Danny Shelton was named Thursday to the academic All-America first team, the only player from the Pac-12 Conference to join the first team and the first Husky football player to earn such an honor in 23 years.
Shelton, a senior nose tackle from Auburn, boasts a 3.54 grade-point average in anthropology. He spent the fall term as a First-Year Interest Group adviser and has also spent two summers in French Polynesia (Tahiti) studying colonization and leading football clinics for adults.
Shelton was one of 24 players selected to the first team by the College Sports Information Directors of America. Ed Cunningham in 1991 was the last UW player to make the academic All-America first team.
Shelton was also named to the all-Pac-12 first team defense on Tuesday. The 339-pound nose tackle is second at UW with 89 tackles, with nine sacks and 16.5 tackles for loss.
On Monday, he was named to the All-Pac-12 academic team for a third straight season. Shelton is the only Pac-12 player recognized on the Capital One Academic All-America Division I first team. Stanford defensive lineman Henry Anderson was named to the second team.