INDIANAPOLIS - Former Georgia swimmer Kim Black, who won a gold medal this summer at the 2001 World University Games in Beijing, China, has been named one of the 10 finalists for the NCAA Woman of the Year award as announced by the NCAA. The award honors outstanding female students-athletes who have excelled in academics, athletics and community leadership.

A native of Liverpool, N.Y., Black helped the Lady Bulldogs to their third straight NCAA championship and fifth consecutive SEC title this year. She was a member of the winning 800-yard freestyle relay team at the 2001 NCAAs and SECs, and she set season-bests in three events at SECs. Black will be a member of the World University Games team after an eighth-place finish in the 200-meter freestyle at World Trials. She won a gold medal as a member the 800-meter freestyle relay team. That is the same event she earned a gold medal in at the 2000 Olympic Games.

The 10 finalists for the 2001 NCAA Woman of the Year award include an Olympian; a Rhodes Scholar finalist; two NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship recipients; and the female winner of the Walter Byers Scholarship, the NCAA's highest academic honor.

This year's finalists, who have an average grade-point of 3.784 on a 4.0 scale, graduated or will graduate with degrees in majors such as cellular and molecular biology, biochemistry, psychology and arts and humanities.

The 10 finalists for 2001 are:

• Kimberly A. Black, University of Georgia - Swimming and Diving
• Camille Cooper, Purdue University - Basketball
• Andrea Dutoit, University of Arizona - Cross Country and Indoor and Outdoor Track and Field
• Kameelah Taliah Elarms, University of California, Davis - Indoor and Outdoor Track and Field
• Kristen English, Swarthmore College - Field Hockey, Basketball, Lacrosse
• K. Elizabeth Flynt, University of Tennessee, Knoxville - Swimming and Diving
• Sunny Gilbert, University of Missouri (Columbia) - Cross Country, Track and Field
• Angie Oxley, University of Nebraska, Lincoln - Volleyball
• Claire Cunanan Reyes, Longwood College - Field Hockey
• Toby Wilmet, Washington College (Maryland) - Field Hockey, Softball

Six of the 10 finalists are NCAA champions or members of national championship teams, one was a three-sport collegiate athlete, and another is a multiple medalist at the World University Games. They are volunteers who assisted the blind, walked horses carrying disabled children, helped at a South African shelter and worked with young people at numerous camps and clinics.

This is the 11th year the Woman of the Year Award has been given, and the theme is "The Stars of Tomorrow."

The finalists were selected by a committee comprised of athletics administrators from NCAA member colleges and universities and a former NCAA Woman of the Year. The NCAA Committee on Women's Athletics will select the 2001 Woman of the Year from among the 10 finalists. The winner will be announced at an awards dinner October 21 at the Indiana Roof Ballroom in Indianapolis.

Last year's winner was Kristy Kowal, a gold-medal Olympic swimmer from the University of Georgia.

Other past winners include:
1999 - Jamila Demby, track and field, University of California, Davis
1998 - Peggy Boutilier, lacrosse and field hockey, University of Virginia
1997 - the late Lisa Ann Coole, University of Georgia, swimming and diving
1996 - Billie Winsett Fletcher, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, volleyball
1995 - Rebecca Lobo, University of Connecticut, basketball
1994 - Tanya Hughes Jones, University of Arizona, track and field
1993 - Nnenna Jean Lynch, Villanova University, cross country and track and field
1992 - Catherine Byrne Maloney, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, swimming and diving
1991 - Mary Beth Riley-Metcalf, Canisius College, cross country