Contact: Chassidy Holloway, Associate Executive Director, holloway@midwestconference.org
 
GRINNELL, Iowa – The Midwest Conference (MWC) has announced Caprice Kalvelage, a women’s swimming & diving student-athlete from Lake Forest College, and Matthew Seeber, a men’s cross country and track & field student-athlete from Ripon College, as the respective recipients of its 2024-25 Ruth Peterson and Roy W. LeClere Awards. These annual honors recognize the female and male student-athletes who achieved the highest grade-point average during their junior years.
 
A senior finance major from Phoenix, Arizona, Kalvelage has maintained a perfect 4.0 GPA throughout her collegiate career. She is a three-time Academic All-MWC honoree and a two-time recipient of the MWC Elite 20 Award for the highest cumulative GPA at the MWC Swimming and Diving Championships. Additionally, she earned College Sports Communicators Academic All-District® honors in 2023-24 and was inducted into the Chi Alpha Sigma National College Athletic Honor Society last spring.
 
In the pool, Kalvelage claimed a conference title as part of Lake Forest’s 800-freestyle relay team, which won the 2022 MWC Championship with a time of 7:47.12, the fourth-fastest in program history. Her 200-freestyle relay team clocked a time of 1:38.10 in 2023, also ranking fourth in program history. Individually, she has placed in the top six at the conference level six times, with her best finish being third in the 200-freestyle in 2022.
 
Kalvelage is the third consecutive Forester and fourth overall to receive the Peterson Award, joining soccer players Paityn Tabor (2022-23) and Ashley Birnesser (2023-24), as well as softball player Kat Beall (2017-18).
 
Seeber is a senior mathematics major with a minor in Educational Studies from Lakewood, Wisconsin. In cross country, he is a two-time All-MWC performer, finishing 15th at the 2022 MWC Championships and 16th in 2023. He also received the MWC Elite 20 Award twice for holding the highest GPA among competitors at the conference championship.
 
On the track, Seeber has been instrumental in Ripon’s three consecutive indoor and outdoor MWC team championships. He won the MWC indoor distance medley relay title in 2023 and 2024 and earned All-MWC honors in the outdoor 10K in 2024 and the indoor distance medley relay in 2022.
 
Academically, Seeber is a three-time Academic All-MWC honoree in both cross country and track and field. He was also named a College Sports Communicators Academic All-District selection in 2024.
 
Seeber is the second Ripon male to win the LeClere Award in four years, following Cormac Madigan (2021-22) of football and baseball. Jason Smith, a cross country and track and field athlete, was Ripon’s first recipient in 2010-11.
 
Ruth Peterson served as Commissioner of the Midwest Athletic Conference for Women and later as Co-Commissioner of the MWC. A Beloit College alumna and employee, she passed away in October 2006.
 
Roy W. LeClere was a devoted collegiate sports enthusiast whose passion for the MWC inspired friends and colleagues to establish the award in his memory.