Morgan Decker

Classroom

Morgan Decker has excelled in the classroom, posting a 3.73 cumulative grade-point average in Lehigh’s rigorous behavioral neuroscience program while minoring in Psychology. A three-year member of the Patriot League Academic Honor Roll, Decker is a two-time Academic All-Patriot League honoree and garnered CoSIDA Academic All-District laurels in 2014. She has made Lehigh’s Dean’s List (GPA of 3.60 or better) in six of her first seven semesters including a 4.0 GPA semester in the fall of 2015. Decker has received seven Lehigh Faculty Athletics Council Academic Awards for posting semester GPAs of 3.20 or better and has been recognized on the NFCA All-Academic Team. She will be applying to physicians assistant school and is considering pursuing her Master’s in Educational Leadership in her gap year.

Character

Decker is so well-respected by her teammates that she was voted captain prior to both her junior and senior seasons. A wrist injury limited Decker in the fall of 2014, and while she still had a very strong junior campaign in the spring of 2015, her batting average was below .400 for the first time in her Lehigh career, and she hit just four home runs after totaling 18 in her first two seasons. Still, Decker played in every game last spring and was a leader for a Lehigh team that won the Patriot League regular season, were tournament championships and returned to the NCAA Tournament after a two-year hiatus.

In addition to her softball captain duties, Decker has been heavily involved in Lehigh’s athletic department. She has been involved in Lehigh’s chapter of Student-Athletes Leading Social Change (SALSC). In Lehigh’s Leadership Academy, Decker graduated from the Emerging Leaders program, where she learned how to be an effective vocal leader on her team and within the Lehigh community. The Leadership Legacies program, where she learned how to interact with coaches and teammates, assisted her in being able to effectively lead a team as a captain. She also is involved in Lehigh’s Student-Athlete Mentor and PRIDE programs, which help Lehigh first-year student-athletes adapt to college life.

Last spring, Decker was recognized with Lehigh’s Class of 1904 Award and the Contribution to Student Life Award, of which character is a major component.

Community

Decker has been involved in several community outreach programs at Lehigh, most notably the annual Adopt-A-Family initiative around the holidays. Each Lehigh Athletics team adopts an underprivileged family; they then raise money throughout the semester to purchase holiday presents for their adopted family. The event wraps up with an event where all the student-athletes present the gifts to the families. Last year, the Lehigh student-athletes raised more than $30,000. In addition to being a student and an athlete, Decker has assisted Lehigh Athletics as the timeout coordinator for home Lehigh football games in both the 2014 and 2015 seasons. She also has spent the last two summers as a ball girl for the Lehigh Valley Iron Pigs, Triple-A affiliate of the Philadelphia Phillies that plays their home games not far from Lehigh’s campus.

Competition

Decker enters her senior season as a three-time All-Patriot League selection (two-time first-team) and a two-time first-team NFCA Mid-Atlantic All-Region selection. In 2013 Decker became the first Patriot League student-athlete to be named the league’s Player and Rookie of the Year, after winning the Patriot League’s Triple Crown in leading the league in batting average, home runs and RBIs. She also was named ECAC Co-Rookie of the Year in 2013. Decker won her second consecutive Patriot League Player of the Year award in 2014. Entering the 2016 season, she owned a .387 career batting average, which ranked seventh in school history, and she sat third in home runs with 22. She had drawn 88 walks, which ranked second in school history.

As a freshman, Decker received Lehigh’s John S. Steckbeck Award, given to the Athletic Department’s top first-year female athlete. As alluded to above, Decker won the Patriot League Triple Crown, batting .415 with nine home runs and 46 RBI. In three years, Decker has won seven Patriot League Player of the Week awards. She has been a mainstay at third base and the No. 3 spot in Lehigh’s batting order. In her first three seasons, Lehigh has posted an impressive 107-45-1 record. The Mountain Hawks have won the Patriot League regular-season title in each of Decker’s three seasons and added the tournament crown in 2015. Lehigh went 1-2 in the NCAA Norman Regional in 2015, posting the program’s first NCAA Tournament win in six years.