UTICA, NY -- Utica College men's hockey goalie Gianluca Baggetta (Maple, Ontario/North York (OJHL)) was named to the 2018-19 CoSIDA Google Cloud Academic All-American® first team, announced Wednesday.  Baggetta was one of only 15 student-athletes to earn first team recognition.   
 
The 2018-19 Google Cloud Academic All-America® Men's At-Large Team, selected by CoSIDA, recognizes the nation's top student athletes for their combined performances in the athletic realm and in the classroom.
 
Baggetta, who was named Utica College's salutatorian, is completing his four-year degree in accounting in a span of just three years. The junior was named the Class of 2019 Salutatorian after achieving a cumulative grade point average of 3.99 and has done so while playing both ice hockey and tennis. He will progress into the pursuit of his Master's in Business Administration here at Utica.
 
This past season Baggetta made a brilliant transition from reserve netminder to All-American candidate in a very short period of time, and had one of the best statistical performances in this decade by any goaltender in the conference. He was named First Team All-UCHC, and was the UCHC Goaltender of the year while backstopping the Pioneers to the UCHC Championship Series and the 2019 UCHC regular season title.
 
Baggetta went undefeated in a school-best 16 straight starts to post a 16-4-2 overall record, and was 10-1-1 in conference play for the second best conference win percentage by a starter in program history. He set new Utica standards for a starting goaltender in save percentage at 94.1 percent, and goals against average at 1.76 goals against per game. His conference game save percentage of 95.3 percent was the best by a UCHC or ECAC West goaltender since Elmira goaltender Darren McDonald's All-American season in 2010-11. Baggetta was fourth nationally in save percentage and tenth in goals against average. He would be just outside the top 25 all-time in Division III save percentage for a single season, and his 93.7 percent career save percentage would currently be in the top ten in Division III history. He has accomplished all of this while becoming one of the college's premier students academically.