BRENTWOOD, Tenn. – Two of the six Ohio Valley Conference Scholar-Athletes for 2024-25 attend the University of Tennessee at Martin as Izzy Patterson (soccer) and Jonathan Xoinis (golf) brought home the prestigious honor today.
Distributed annually to three female and three male student-athletes, the OVC Scholar-Athlete Award is considered the highest individual honor that can be earned by an OVC student-athlete. Recipients were selected from a group of finalists by a vote of OVC Faculty Athletics Representatives as they must have performed athletically with distinction, earned at least a 3.5 Grade Point Average and conducted themselves in a manner which has brought credit to the student-athlete, their institution, intercollegiate athletics and the OVC. The award is based on academic and athletic criteria/accomplishments achieved during the 2023-24 school year.
The duo of Patterson and Xoinis are the 21st and 22nd all-time Skyhawk winners of this award as this marks only the third time in school history that UT Martin boasted both a female and male winner in the same year (also occurring in 2014-15 and 1996-97). Patterson joins Jamie Furstenberg (2008-09) as the only Skyhawk soccer players to win this honor while Xoinis is the second golfer to achieve this accolade, joining Ben Reeves from 2014-15.
Patterson recently concluded her fourth season on the UT Martin soccer team, becoming the first player in program history to be named All-OVC first team three times (2022, 2023, 2024) while also receiving All-OVC second team and All-Newcomer status in 2021. The midfielder from St. Louis, Mo. started in 71 of her 72 career matches played while ranking ninth in school history with 163 shots. She totaled 28 points (10 goals, eight assists) while logging 5,801 career minutes.
Off the pitch, Patterson owns a perfect 4.0 GPA as a health and human performance major and has claimed three OVC Academic Medals of Honor to go along with numerous UT Martin Chancellor’s Honor Roll awards. She is a member of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), the UT Martin Athletics Board Advisory Committee, the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, the Phi Eta Sigma Honor Society and the National Society of Leadership & Success. She has volunteered with Special Olympics, the UT Martin Captain’s Pantry and youth clinics amongst other community service activities.
Hailing from Chattanooga, Tenn., Xoinis is in his fifth season with the Skyhawk golf program. After taking a redshirt season, he was spotlighted as an OVC All-Newcomer in 2021-22 while winning OVC Golfer of the Week accolades twice (April 6, 2022 and Sept. 21, 2023) in his career. Midway through his final season of collegiate eligibility, he has completed 102 rounds with a 74.9 stroke average with three top-five tournament finishes in his career.
Xoinis won an OVC Academic Medal of Honor for a flawless 4.0 GPA and was also a Cobalt Golf All-America Scholar in 2023-24. He graduated with a 3.89 cumulative GPA while majoring in engineering and currently maintains a 4.0 GPA as a graduate student. A recipient of the highly decorated Upper Division Engineering Award, he has also served as the treasurer of the IEEE Robotics Society and has volunteered with the Silverdale Baptist Church Camp, participated in the Soybean Festival parade and organized an alumni golf scramble.
Other winners of the 2024-25 OVC Scholar-Athlete Award include Eastern Illinois’ Mackenzie Aldridge (cross country/track and field), Southeast Missouri’s Paxton DeLaurent (football), Eastern Illinois’ Chad Smith (soccer) and Tennessee Tech’s Katie Toney (soccer).
