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Brian Khoury of Carnegie Mellon Selected as a William V. Campbell Trophy Semifinalist

Brian Khoury of Carnegie Mellon Selected as a William V. Campbell Trophy Semifinalist

From Carnegie Mellon University Athletics

Selected as the best and brightest from the college gridiron, The National Football Foundation & College Hall of Fame (NFF) announced the 156 semifinalists for the 2016 William V. Campbell Trophy, presented by Fidelity Investments. The award recognizes an individual as the absolute best scholar-athlete in the nation and is prominently displayed inside its official home at the New York Athletic Club. Carnegie Mellon's senior defensive end Brian Khoury (Davenport, Iowa/Bettendorf) is one of 33 Division III players on the list of 156 student-athletes.

Of the 33 Division III student-athletes, Khoury is the lone University Athletic Association (UAA) honoree and is joined by Brandon Martuccio of Washington & Jefferson College as the two semifinalists from the Presidents' Athletic Conference (PAC).

Khoury currently leads the PAC and UAA which ranks 10th nationally with 4.5 sacks for the season. The senior has recorded 7.0 tackles for a loss which ranks fourth in the PAC and 20th nationally. He is tied for second on the school's all-time sack list with 21.5 and needs 3.0 sacks to become first all-time.

Khoury, an electrical and computer engineering major, has a 3.49 grade point average, while appearing on the Carnegie Mellon University Dean's List.  The past two summers he has interned at Ford Motor Company in Michigan. He was named a 2015 CoSIDA Academic All-American, a nominee for the 2016 Allstate AFCA Good Works Team, a 2014 Capital One Academic All-District honoree, is a two-time PAC and UAA Academic member and a UAA Presidents Scholar-Athlete Team honoree throughout his career.

Last season, Khoury was an All-America Honorable Mention honoree by D3football.com, was named UAA Defensive Player of the Year and first team All-PAC. Khoury was a finalist for the 2015 Cliff Harris Award, which is presented to the top small college defensive player in the nation. He broke the school single-season record with 13.5 sacks and the single-game sack record with 4.0.

Prior to coming to Carnegie Mellon, he played four years of junior hockey in the developmental leagues. Khoury is a member of the Carnegie Mellon Solar Racing team, where he is the president and power team co-chair.  The defensive end is also a member of Fellowship of Christian Athletes which has been renamed to Tartan Athlete Fellowship and received the Ford Blue Oval Vehicle Team Scholarship. He often spends time mentoring a Pittsburgh teenager helping to take his mind off medical issues caused by brain tumors. Khoury also has volunteered at the Western Spring Sectional competition of the Special Olympics of Pennsylvania and with the 1,000+ Service Day initiative at Carnegie Mellon which brings together students, faculty, staff and alumni to volunteer at multiple sites throughout the greater Pittsburgh area.

To be nominated for the William V. Campbell Trophy, student-athletes need to be submitted by their schools, which are limited to one nominee each. Candidates for the awards must be a senior or graduate student in their final year of eligibility, have a GPA of at least 3.2 on a 4.0 scale, have outstanding football ability as a first team player or significant contributor and have demonstrated strong leadership and citizenship. The class is selected each year by the NFF Awards Committee, which is comprised of a nationally recognized group of media, College Football Hall of Famers and athletics administrators.

Named in honor of the late Bill Campbell, former chairman of Intuit, former player and head coach at Columbia University and the 2004 recipient of the NFF's Gold Medal, the Campbell Trophy is a 25-pound bronze trophy and increases the amount of the recipient's grant by $7,000 for a total postgraduate scholarship of $25,000. This year's postgraduate scholarships will push the program's all-time distribution to more than $11.1 million.

Launched in 1959, the NFF National Scholar-Athlete Awards program became the first initiative in history to award postgraduate scholarships based on both a player's academic and athletic accomplishments, and it has recognized 816 outstanding individuals since its inception. The Campbell Trophy, first awarded in 1990, adds to the program's prestige, having previously honored two Rhodes Scholars, a Rhodes Scholar finalist, two Heisman Trophy winners and five first-round NFL draft picks.

The NFF will announce 12-14 finalists on November 1, and each of them will receive an $18,000 postgraduate scholarship as a member of the NFF National Scholar-Athlete Class, presented by Fidelity Investments. The finalists will travel to New York City for the 59th NFF Annual Awards Dinner on Dec. 6, where their accomplishments will be highlighted in front of one of the most powerful audiences in all of sports. At the event, one member of the class will be declared the winner of the 27th William V. Campbell Trophy and have his postgraduate scholarship increased to $25,000.