• All-Time OVC Male Athletes of the Year
BRENTWOOD, Tenn. – Murray State sophomore point guard
Cameron Payne has been selected as the Ohio Valley Conference Male Athlete of the Year for 2014-15 in voting by the league’s athletics directors and sports information directors.
The Female Athlete of the Year will be announced on Friday. Payne will receive his award at the League’s annual Honors Brunch on May 29 in Nashville.
Payne was named the OVC Player of the Year after helping Murray State to just the fifth perfect (16-0) Conference record in league history, the program’s 24th OVC regular season championship, a Conference record 25-game winning streak and a Top 25 national ranking. For the season he averaged 20.2 points and 6.0 assists per game which ranked 13th and 15th nationally.
During the year he became the second fastest player in Murray State history to reach 1,000 career points, doing so in just 57 games. After leading his team to the championship game of the OVC Tournament, Payne helped direct the team to a pair of victories in the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) as MSU would finish the season 29-6 overall.
Following the season he was named a third-team All-American by CBSSports.com, an honorable mention All-American by the Associated Press and the Lute Olson National Player of the Year by CollegeInsider.com. A projected first round selection, Payne then declared for the NBA Draft, becoming the first sophomore and just the fourth player ever from the OVC stay give declare with eligibility remaining and stay in the draft.
Payne is the seventh different Murray State student-athlete to be named OVC Male Athlete of the Year and first since Isaiah Canaan earned the honor in 2011-12. All the winners (who have won nine combined awards) have been men’s basketball players. Overall it marks the third time in the last five years that the OVC Male Athlete of the Year has been a men’s basketball player.
Other male nominees for the award included Austin Peay senior tennis athlete Dimitar Ristovski, Belmont senior third baseman Matt Beaty, Eastern Illinois junior track athlete Norvel Mohammed, Eastern Kentucky senior basketball guard Corey Walden, Jacksonville State senior offensive lineman Max Holcombe, Morehead State senior catcher Chris Robinson, Southeast Missouri State senior track athlete Blake Smith, Tennessee State senior linebacker Nick Thrasher, Tennessee Tech junior tennis athlete Alex Arovin and UT Martin senior golfer Brendon Caballero.
The OVC first awarded a Male Athlete of the Year award in 1977.