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Southern Indiana junior
Alex Nolan and junior
Ellie Hall were named the 2025 OVC Male and Female Cross Country Athletes of the Year in a vote of league head coaches and announced on the eve of the 2025 OVC Cross Country Championship.
In addition, USI’s
Kraedyn Young and Tennessee Tech’s
Joy Jepleting were named the 2025 OVC Freshmen of the Year.
Prior to the 2011 season the awards for the top honors in cross country were determined by placement at the OVC Championship but were changed to a vote in 2011. This year's OVC Championship will be held on Friday, October 31 on the campus of the Eastern Illinois University. Following the race, the awards for Athletes of the Championships, Coach of the Year and the All-OVC teams will be awarded.
Nolan holds the top 6K and 8K time in the OVC this season and was named OVC Runner of the Week three times. He began the season by winning the Stegemoller Twilight with a 6K time of 17:46.0, 28 seconds better than second place. He followed that by placing 20th out of 460 competitors at the Southern Showcase, running what proved to be the second-best 8K time in the OVC this year (24:06.3). Nolan would improve that time by five seconds two weeks later, placing 18th out of 260 runners at the Gans Creek Classic; his time of 24:01.5 ranks sixth-best in USI program history. He capped his regular season by placing 14th at the Angel Mounds Invitational. Nolan is the second-straight USI male runner to win this award.
Hall was the second USI runner across the line in the first two meets this season, before taking the team’s top spot in the final two races, each time earning OVC Runner of the Week honors. At the Gans Creek Classic she ran the fastest 6K time in the OVC this season (20:58.5), a mark that was eighth in school history. At that race she placed 10th out of 238 competitors. She followed that with a sixth-place finish at the Angel Mounds Invitational in a field of 160. She is the second USI runner to win this award (and first since 2022).
Young tallied the fastest 8K time by an OVC freshman this season when he ran 24:44.1 at the Gans Creek Classic, which placed him 87th out of 253 runners; that time is the seventh-fastest 8K time by any competitor in the league in 2025. Young followed that with a time of 24:49.8 at the Angel Mounds Invitational, placing 24th out of 194 (including being the first OVC freshman across the line). He is the second USI runner to earn this honor (joining Nolan who won the award two years ago).
Jepleting had her season-best 5K time (18:08.9) at the Louisville Cross Country Classic at the start of October. That placed her 79th in the field of 305 runners; that time was the ninth-best in the OVC this season. Jepleting followed that by placing 22nd at the Angel Mounds Invitational, a race that included 160 competitors. Her 6K time of 21:57.2 was the 10th-best in the OVC this season. Jepleting is the fourth TTU athlete to earn the award and first since 2021.