Ben Strong Named Guilford Student-Athlete of the Week
Greensboro, N.C.(1/22/08) -- Men's basketball senior Ben Strong won Guilford College's Student-Athlete of the Week Award Tuesday. He has won the weekly prize presented by Guilford's Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC) six times this year.
Strong, a 6-11, 220-pound center, averaged 26.0 points, 12.5 rebounds and 3.5 blocked shots per game in the Quakers' 1-1 week. He totalled 13 points, 10 rebounds and two blocks, all game highs, in the Quakers’ 68-56 loss at Roanoke College Jan. 16. Strong scored a season-best 39 points, grabbed a game-high 15 boards and added five blocks in Guilford’s 120-112 victory at Emory & Henry College Jan. 19. The center was 14-of-17 from the floor on his way to his 10th double-double this season. Strong has recorded 33 double-doubles in his career as a Quaker, and he has 10 games with at least 20 points this season, including three 30-point efforts.
Strong leads the Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC) in scoring (24.9 ppg.), rebounding (11.5 rpg.) and blocked shots (2.54 bpg.). He has paced Guilford's scorers in 12 of 14 games and has been the team's top rebounder 10 times. The reigning NCAA Division III Player of the Year starts the week ranked eighth among Guilford’s career scoring (1,818) and rebounding (765) leaders.
Coach Tom Palombo's Quakers (9-4, 4-2 ODAC) have won five of their last seven games and has three ODAC games this week. In addition to road games at Bridgewater College (1/26) and Eastern Mennonite University (1/27), the Quakers host Roanoke in the Ragan-Brown Field House Wednesday (1/23) at 7:00 p.m.
The Student-Athlete of the Week Award is presented by Guilford's SAAC, which is comprised of representatives from each of the school's 16 varsity teams. The group meets regularly to discuss the state of Guilford Athletics and seeks to build community among the school's student-athletes and non-student-athletes. Recent Guilford SAAC activities include canned-food drives, volunteer assistance with the North Carolina Special Olympics and tutoring at New Garden Friends School.