Richie Paul takes the ball and does it all for Guilford College Quakers

GUILFORD’S RICHIE PAUL WINS WEEKLY AWARDS

Greensboro, N.C. –Guilford College’s Richie Paul (Fort Myers, Fla./Bishop Verot (Quincy)) won the Old Dominion Athletic Conference’s (ODAC) Defensive Football Player of the Week Award Monday. He is Guilford’s second recipient of the weekly defensive prize this season. Paul, a senior, also picked up Guilford’s Student-Athlete of the Week prize, presented by Guilford’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC).

Paul led Guilford’s tacklers for the eighth straight contest with a game-and career-high 18 stops (10 solo), his second 18-tackle game in a row. Paul recorded a sack among his two tackles for loss and broke up a pass in the 20-13 win over Randolph-Macon College Oct. 3. He had a hand in a key fourth-down stop in the fourth quarter on Guilford’s 11-yard line. The Quakers’ defense held Randolph-Macon to three-for-15 on third down conversion attempts after the Yellow Jackets entered the game with a league-best 41.3 conversion percentage.

Paul is the ODAC’s leading tackler through games of Oct. 31 and has had seven straight games with 10 or more stops. He ranked third among NCAA Division III tackles per game leaders (13.62) through games of Oct. 31. Paul’s career-high 109 stops this season are the most by a Quaker since Luke Martin ’00 made 113 stops in 1998.

He was one of 90 NCAA Division III seniors selected to participate in the inaugural D-III Classic All-Star Game Dec. 5 in Salem, Va.

Coach Kevin Kiesel’s Quakers (2-6, 1-3 ODAC) continue their season Nov. 7 at Catholic University.

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 a canned-food drive, and the start of a new program, Champs Life Skills which maintains intercollegiate athletics as an integral part of the campus educational program and the student-athlete as an integral part of the student body. Its aim is to increase student-athletes’ community involvement, as well as engage the Guilford community with the athletic department.

Dave Walters
Guilford College Athletics