BRENTWOOD, Tenn. – Tarence Guinyard, a star guard on the University of Tennessee at Martin men’s basketball team, has earned All-Ohio Valley Conference first team accolades as well as OVC All-Newcomer honors as the league announced its postseason selections today.
Guinyard becomes just the fifth player in program history to win both of those awards during the same season, joining Lester Hudson (2007-08), KJ Simon (2021-22), Jordan Sears (2022-23) and Jacob Crews (2023-24). Overall, Guinyard is the 12th different Skyhawk to nab All-OVC first team status and the 16th to be named an OVC All-Newcomer.
In conference play, Guinyard found himself in the top-10 in three separate statistical categories this season, ranking second in scoring average (16.8 points per game), fourth in field goal percentage (.435) and ninth in steals (1.6 per contest). Overall, he averaged 16.2 points per outing (fourth in the OVC), 4.7 rebounds per game, 2.2 assists per contest and 1.4 steals per outing. He shot 44.8 percent from the floor (fifth-best in the OVC) and drained 74.4 percent of his free throw attempts – the 10th highest accuracy in the league. His 131 makes from the charity stripe are just two away from cracking the UT Martin single-season top-10 while his 176 free throw attempts are tied for the 10th most in Skyhawk men’s basketball history.
Guinyard started to take off after the first month of the season, leading UT Martin in scoring in 14 of his final 22 games played (15 times overall in 2024-25). He pieced together a trio of career-best 31-point performances in a seven-game span, accomplishing that feat at Alabama State (Dec. 11), against Champion Christian (Dec. 15) and at Western Illinois (Jan. 9).
The 6-2, 170-pound speedster pumped in at least 20 points in eight separate contests, including four of his last six outings against OVC competition. Known to produce points in bunches, Guinyard hit a career-high seven treys (in 10 attempts) at Southern Indiana on Dec. 21 and reached double figures in free throws made twice – including a career-best 12 swishes against Western Illinois on Feb. 8.
Guinyard accumulated 26 points and a career-best 12 rebounds (to go along with four assists and three steals) at Tennessee Tech on Feb. 20, which was one of nine games where he hauled in at least seven rebounds. He distributed at least four assists on five separate occasions and managed 14 multi-steal performances (career-high four swipes in the aforementioned Jan. 9 game at Western Illinois).
The Tampa, Fla. native began his award-winning season on Dec. 16 when he became only the fifth Skyhawk to sweep both the OVC Player and Newcomer of the Week honors on the same day. A little over 24 hours later, Guinyard was spotlighted as one of five Oscar Robertson Trophy National Players of the Week in NCAA Division I men’s basketball by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association.
UT Martin opens the 2025 OVC Basketball Championship men’s portion tomorrow, taking on No. 5 seed Tennessee Tech at 6 p.m. at the Ford Center in Evansville, Ind.
