Eastern Washington University football senior safety Dehonta Hayes and sixth-year senior center Spencer Blackburn have been selected to the Academic All-District 8 Football Team as selected by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA).
 
Hayes, a 2015 graduate of Lincoln High School in Tacoma, Wash., completed studies toward his communications studies degree at the end of summer quarter and is enrolled in communication studies graduate school for fall quarter. He has a 3.80 grade point average at Eastern.
 
A 3.69 student, Blackburn has completed his economics major, but won't graduate until he finishes his second major in accounting this fall. He is a 2014 graduate of Meridian High School in Bellingham, Wash., and was a member of the Academic All-District 8 Football Team a year ago.
 
Blackburn has been honored three times on the Big Sky Conference All-Academic team, and Hayes has been honored twice previously.
 
Both Hayes and Blackburn now advance to the national ballot to select Academic All-America honors. Most recently, Cooper Kupp earned Academic All-America honors back-to-back in 2015 and 2016 for the Eagles, who have had eight different players win 12 Academic All-America honors since 1989. A total of 69 have now been honored since then on the All-District squad, which includes NCAA Football Championship Subdivision (FCS) and Bowl Subdivision (FBS) football players from schools in Washington, Oregon, California, Idaho, Utah, Arizona, Nevada, Alaska, Hawaii and British Columbia.
 
On the field, Hayes is EWU's leading tackler this season with 105, and ranks 11th in the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision with an average of 10.5 per game.  He also has a pair of interceptions, a forced fumble and a pass broken up through 10 games. In 36 career games (19 as a starter), Hayes has 198 tackles, three interceptions, five passes broken up, a forced fumble and a fumble recovery.
 
Blackburn was selected on Oct. 30 to the 2019 National Football Foundation (NFF) National Scholar-Athlete Class and is one of 12 finalists nationally for the 2019 William V. Campbell Trophy® Presented by Mazda. The Campbell Trophy annually recognizes an individual as the absolute best football scholar-athlete in the nation for his combined academic success, football performance and exemplary leadership. The winner of the award will be announced on Dec. 10.
 
Blackburn has a streak of 47 consecutive starts (49 total games played) since taking over the center position in the fourth game of the 2016 season. He's earned second-team All-Big Sky honors in each of the last three seasons, and earned NCAA Football Championship Subdivision All-America honors a year ago.
 
Eastern enters this Saturday's (Nov. 16) game at Cal Poly game as the FCS leader in total offense (524.3), with 1,395 yards in the last two games. The Eagles are second in FCS in passing (336.9), 34th in rushing (187.4) and fifth in scoring (39.2). Eastern had 706 versus Northern Arizona on Nov. 2 to rank fifth in school history, and 689 at Idaho State on Nov. 9 to rank seventh all-time. Eastern has also had a school-record 769 this season versus Lindenwood, and 637 against Northern Colorado on Oct. 12 to rank as the 19th most in EWU history.
 
Last summer, Blackburn was one of just 28 players nationally to be honored on the Athlon 2019 Preseason NCAA Football Championship Subdivision All-America Team.  It was one of four preseason All-America honors Blackburn earned in the summer, as he also earned second team preseason All-America honors from STATS, Hero Sports and Phil Steele.  
 
Blackburn is a sixth-year senior in 2019 after he received approval from the Big Sky Conference and the NCAA for their hardship waiver requests to receive a sixth year to complete four years of eligibility.  He redshirted in 2014, but couldn't play in 2015 because of a thumb injury. In 2018 he earned NCAA Football Championship Subdivision All-America honors by Associated Press (second team) and STATS (third team).
 
A total of 14 Big Sky Conference players earn spots on this year's academic all-district teams.