Youngstown State senior men's golf student-athlete Ryan Sam was named to the 2026 College Sports Communicators Academic All-District® Men's At-Large Team, the organization announced on Tuesday.
Sam collects the honor for the first time in his accomplished career to become the program's first Academic All-District honoree since the 2022-23 season. The Canfield, Ohio, native was also named to the 2026 Horizon League All-Academic Team to become the program's first all-academic honoree since 2023. He maintained a 3.72 GPA as a senior finance major at Youngstown State.
Sam, YSU's lone senior and team captain in 2025-26, was selected to the All-Horizon League Second Team following his fourth and final collegiate campaign. He participated in all 12 tournaments and 36 rounds as a senior in 2025-26. Sam averaged a team and career best 73.2 strokes per round with a low round of 67 while earning two top 10 finishes and seven top 25 performances this past season.
Sam was one of three Penguins to set a new single-season school record with 36 rounds played in 2025-26. The senior's 73.2 strokes per round average ranks as the sixth-lowest single-season mark in program history. Sam was also named the Under Armour Horizon League Men's Golfer of the Week on March 12, 2026.
An undergraduate student-athlete must have at least a 3.50 cumulative grade point average (on a 4.0 scale) to earn CSC Academic All-District recognition. They must also be a sophomore academically and above to meet the academic criteria.
The CSC Academic All-America® program separately recognizes at-large honorees in four divisions — NCAA Division I, NCAA Division II, NCAA Division III and NAIA — in the sports of Women's Beach Volleyball, Women's Bowling, Women's Crew/Rowing, Men's and Women's Fencing, Women's Field Hockey, Men's and Women's Golf, Men's and Women's Gymnastics, Men's and Women's Ice Hockey, Men's and Women's Lacrosse, Men's and Women's Rifle, Men's and Women's Skiing, Men's Volleyball, Men's and Women's Water Polo and Men's Wrestling.
College Sports Communicators was founded in 1957 and is a 4,700+ member national association for strategic, creative and digital communicators across intercollegiate athletics in the United States and Canada. From its founding in 1957 until the 2022 name change, the organization was known as College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA).
The organization, which celebrated its 65th year during the 2021-22 academic year, is the second oldest management association in all of intercollegiate athletics. College Sports Communicators became an affiliated partner with NACDA (National Association of Collegiate Directors of Athletics) in December of 2008.
