BLOOMINGTON, MN - Utica College junior kicker Maki Medici (Watervliet, NY/Shaker) has been named to the D3Football.com National Team of the Week for week 9 of the 2019 season. The award was announced on Tuesday by the national website covering all aspects of Division III football. This is the first such award for the Pioneers from D3Football.com this season. 

Medici earns the award following his decisive performance in a key Empire 8 game on Saturday. He comprised the entirety of the second half scoring to help Utica put away Alfred in a 19-10 win. He went 4-for-4 on field goals with a career-long 48-yard field goal in the second half. With the Pioneers down 10-7 late in the second quarter, Medici hit a 34 yard field goal through the uprights as time expired to tie the game heading into halftime. With the defense shutting the Saxons out in the second half, Medici shouldered the scoring load for Utica with additional field goals of 21, 30, and 48 yards to lift Utica to the win. He also made his lone PAT attempt of the day.

Medici's 48 yard field goal was the second longest in program history. He also excelled as the team's punter on Saturday. Medici averaged 43 yards on three punts, with a long of 46 yards. He left Alfred inside their own 20 yard line twice.

He leads Division III with an average of 1.75 field goals made per game, and he is fourth in field goal percentage. His field goal percentage of 93.3 percent has been compiled with fourteen field goals made on fifteen attempts. He has the highest make percentage in Division III of anyone with a missed field goal on their record this season. Just three players in Division III remain perfect on field goals, and none of those players leading Medici in field goal percentage have attempted more than ten field goals. He has attempted the fourth most in Division III. 

He is tied for fourteenth in all of college football in field goal percentage, and all but four players ahead of him are in the Football Bowl Subdivision comprising many of the major college programs nationally. He is also eighteenth in all of college football in field goals per game. 

The Pioneers are on the road on Saturday as they visit Union College.