Bradynn Belcher, Campus Carrier asst. sports editor
There is no I in team.
This is a statement that has been ingrained into athletes for years to a point that it has become a core value to many collegiate athletes competing in team sports.
We is greater than me.
This is another cliché that many athletes can recite off the top of their heads as if it was the alphabet.
Team sports, especially at the collegiate level, emphasize the importance of obtaining a ‘team first’ mentality. Individual accomplishments are never individual, but team accomplishments. At the end of the day, athletes on the same team wear the same name on their chest, giving up their individuality for a purpose they deem greater than themselves.
The Southern Athletic Association (SAA) has created a culture for team and individual recognition, providing athletes from SAA affiliated schools the opportunity to be honored for stand-out performances throughout their respective seasons.
SAA awards include Academic Honor Roll, All-Conference Teams, All-Sportsmanship Teams, Commissioner’s Cup, and Man and Woman of the Year. These prestigious awards offer teams and individuals another facet of competition on and off the field throughout the year.
The SAA only distributes these awards once a year, risking the chance of an athlete losing sight and competitive drive for these awards throughout their long seasons.
Luckily, the SAA rewards Athlete of the Week awards to individuals from every SAA sanctioned sport throughout the year, giving athletes tangible-individual goals to compete for throughout their respective seasons.
SAA Athlete of the Week awards have proven to be a hot commodity for Berry athletes. In just four weeks, eight Berry athletes, representing four sports, have already claimed this prestigious honor.
Junior running back Josh Rodgers won the first SAA Football Offensive Athlete of the Week award of his career on Sept. 5th for his dominating contribution in Berry’s opening season 67-43 victory over Huntingdon College. The Griffin, Ga., native ran for 194 yards and two touchdowns. Despite Rodger’s exceptional statistics and performance, he was not expecting to finally win his first SAA Football Offensive Athlete of the Week award.
“I never anticipated winning a player of the week,” Rodgers said. “I try to never look at how many yards I have or anything because I always look at what I could do better. I guess you could say it is a dream come true for any player.”
Though this is an individual recognition, Rodgers exhibited his team first mentality as he was adamant about the support he received from his teammates after this honor was announced by the SAA.
“I couldn’t have done it without my offensive line,” Rodgers said. “My teammates were super proud and super happy because I’m not a guy that talks too much, so I didn’t even acknowledge the award myself. My teammates were really happy, and they kept reposting [the award] and talked to me all week about it. That was just a good feeling to have.”
Right side hitter for the Vikings volleyball team, Bella Boston, secured her first SAA Offensive Athlete of the Week award on Sept. 18 after a week of dominating the court with 28 kills against regionally and nationally ranked opponents.
Like Rodgers, Boston said this was not a goal she set for herself at the beginning of the season, but her individual and team training set her up for success in high pressure situations.
“The key is to push each other in practice each and every day just to get better,” Boston said. “If one person is struggling, [we build] them up and really work on the mental side of [volleyball] as well, we talk a lot about like mental recoveries and that has really been like a big thing for me, especially because I feel like I do well in pressure situations because my teammates have helped me to reset after each point and be being willing to make an error and bounce back from it.”
Boston said that individual achievement is not the only factor in the SAA league office determining an award recipient. A Berry player winning this honor is a direct reflection of how successful the team is doing at that point in the season.
“I think a lot of it just kind of shows the team aspect and how well your team is doing because it truly is, no matter what individual gets the award, it truly is based on how your team is doing,” Boston said. “It really shows how well your team works together and supports you in that specific moment and that specific week.”
For a player to be considered by the SAA as a player of the week award recipient, their coaches must look at each of their players statistical performances from the previous week and choose which player to nominate to the SAA based on who has the best chance of winning. In athletes with a competitive drive, this could foster internal competition within the team. Head volleyball coach Caitlyn Moriarty does not worry about this as she nominates one of her players. Moriarty does not see it as an individual award, but a reflection on the success of the team.
“Our players are very supportive and proud of one another, particularly their positional group,” Moriarty said. “We view all awards as team awards because it’s such a team sport.”
Senior Teagan Fritts is not a stranger to earning SAA accolades. The golfer racked up her second player of the week award on Sept. 15 after finishing in first place at the Transylvania Fall Invitational in Lexington, Ky. Though golf is arguably an individual sport with few team aspects, she said that she would much rather earn a team win at a tournament than an individual player of the week award.
“I would rather win the conference tournament,” Fritts said. “Especially it being my senior year, I want to see the team succeed and go to nationals.”
Additional Berry SAA Player of the Week award recipients for this season include Blake Hembree (24C) and Hunter Coleman (26C) representing the Berry football program. Maggie Jones (23C) was the Women’s Soccer Defensive Athlete of the Week for Sept. 5. Volleyball players Jazzy Innis (24C) and Kate Whittle (25C) round out the award winners thus far this season, receiving this recognition for the week of Sept. 11.
Though Berry athletes are well represented in the weekly awards, teammates often think that the Vikings deserve more recognition.
“I think that something really cool about our team is we have so many people that can get weekly awards every week because we do have a big bench that can all contribute on a different day,” Boston said. “I really think that anyone on our team deserves a weekly award.”