Princeton University Athletics
Alex Sierk: 1916 Cup
March 31, 2000 | General
1916 Cup
Awarded each year to the Princeton varsity letterwinner who continuing in competition in his or her senior year achieved at graduation the highest academic standing. Given by the Class of 1916 on the occasion of its 15th reunion.
Alex Sierk
This is the last one. Promise. This is the last award Alex Sierk is going to win at Princeton, mostly because he's won everything else there is to win.
Sierk, perhaps the most decorated scholar-athlete in Princeton history, was named winner of the Class of 1916 Cup. In addition to this honor, he was one of two senior athletes to deliver a keynote address at the Varsity Club banquet.
Sierk, the placekicker for the Tiger football team for all 40 games of his career, graduated with a 3.986 grade-point average in molecular biology. He will be attending Washington University medical school in St. Louis this fall.
Sierk graduates with Princeton records for field goals in a career (36), most points by kicking in a career (184) and consecutive field goals made (15) and was a two-time All-America. He was also named a first-team Academic All-America and the Burger King national Division I-AA scholar-athlete and won an NCAA postgraduate scholarship and a National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame postgraduate scholarship (becoming the first placekicker ever to do so). In addition he won the Pyne Prize, Princeton University's highest undergraduate honor and received a full scholarship to medical school.
Sierk kicked a field goal on the final play of his freshman season to give Princeton its first outright Ivy championship in 31 years. He made his first 15 field goals of 1997 and then started 1998 with the first points in brand-new Princeton Stadium.
He finished with 36 field goals, with a long of 51 yards.