GREENSBORO, N.C. – Guilford College freshman Zeb Richardson (West Jefferson, N.C./Ashe County) collected the Old Dominion Athletic Conference’s (ODAC) Men’s Basketball Player of the Week Award Monday. He is Guilford’s first recipient of the league’s weekly honor this season.
Richardson also earned Guilford’s Student-Athlete of the Week honor, which is given by the school’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee. Richardson, a 6-8, 210-pound center, averaged 15.5 points and 10.5 rebounds per game in the Quakers’ two victories last week. He made all 11 of his free throws and added two blocks as Guilford extended its season-best winning streak to six games. Richardson posted 17 points and 15 rebounds, both career highs, in the Quakers’ 84-61 win at Methodist University Jan. 2. Three days later, he led all scorers with 14 points and added six rebounds in Guilford’s 68-54 home triumph over nationally ranked ODAC-foe Hampden-Sydney College. Richardson made four-of-six shots from the floor and blocked a shot in the win over
the 24th-ranked Tigers. He also had a hand in the Quakers’ defense effort that held Hampden-Sydney to a season-low 32.3 field-goal shooting percentage.
Through the first 13 games of his college career, Richardson ranks second in the ODAC with 8.3 rebounds per game and is the Quakers’ third-leading scorer (11.8 ppg.). He shoots an efficient 53.8 percent from the field, the league’s 12th-best mark, and stands sixth in the league with 1.3 blocks per game. Richardson tops Guilford with four double-doubles this season. During the Quakers’ six-game winning streak, he has averaged 13.8 points, 11.5 rebounds and 1.8 blocks per game while shooting over 49 percent from the floor.
Coach Tom Palombo’s Quakers are 11-2 (3-1 ODAC) headed into Wednesday’s (1/9) conference game at Emory & Henry College. The Student-Athlete of the Week Award is presented by Guilford’s Student Athlete Advisory Committee, which is comprised of representatives from each of the school’s 20 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 participation in Champs Life Skills, which promotes intercollegiate athletics as a key 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 and to engage the greater Guilford community with the athletic department.