Adriana Borrego
palmettoreport@gmail.com

(Rock Hill, S.C.) — Every year the Winthrop University athletic department hosts an event to recognize the accomplishments of its student athletes, which is modeled after the popular ESPY Awards produced by ESPN.

The WUSPYs is a formal event that honors student-athletes, coaches and staff members for their academic and athletic successes over the past year.

“What I really like about the WUSPYs is that it really recognizes all the athletes, all teams and all their individual and team successes throughout the year. So, I really enjoy that,” said Tommy Kamarad, a graduate student from the men’s basketball team.

“It was very well done. It was amazing to finally get to honor everybody and all their hard work on and off the field,” said Zaria Winston, a freshman on the women’s soccer team.

The event, which was hosted by the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee April 27 in the Richardson Ballroom, gave out awards in a number of categories, including male and female athlete of the year, coach of the year, newcomer of the year, best performance and the Golden Eagle award.

“This year my favorite part was getting to present an award and also getting to win an award,” said Tori Iannotti, a senior from the women’s lacrosse team, who was presented with the female Iron Eagle award.

Iannotti, who was also recently recognized as a Comporium Student Athlete of the month for May, just completed the spring semester with a 4.0 GPA.

However, some of the students said their favorite part of the night was simply getting to put on their best formal attire.

“The reason I like the WUSPYs is I like to dress up,” said Emma Roberson, a junior on the softball team.

“I like dressing up too, so that’s fun,” said Kamarad, who also delivered the event’s opening remarks.

“I had a lot of fun with my opening speech,” he said “The energy (of the crowd) kind of sucked, but you know we had to pick it up a little bit.”

The first WUSPYs was held in the fall of 2018.