General | 7/16/2025 12:00:00 PM
OXFORD, Ohio -- The River States Conference is pleased to announce the selection of Shawnee State University basketball player Tre Beard as the 2024-25 River States Conference Male Athlete of the Year. The 2024-25 RSC Player of the Year earns the award as the top male athlete in the conference, which includes nine RSC championship sports for men.
The Athlete of the Year is selected via a vote of conference athletic directors, and comes from a pool of all Player of the Year recipients.
Beard is the second consecutive men's basketball player to earn the award, and the first athlete from Shawnee State to win the award since the Bears joined the conference prior to the 2023-24 school year. In the past 16 years, five men's basketball players have been named the RSC Athlete of the Year, the most of any sport.
The 2025 RSC Player of the Year and a Third-Team NAIA All-American, Beard became the first player in the history of the men's basketball program at Shawnee State to not only obtain All-American honors on both the academic and athletic side of the house, but the first player to accomplish that feat in the same season as well, earning Second-Team College Sports Communicators Academic All-America honors as well. Beard was also one of only seven players to also earn a NAIA All-American and a CSC-NAIA Academic All-America honor in 2024-25.
For the 2024-25 season as a whole, Beard dropped in 19.1 points, 3.7 rebounds, 2.9 assists and 1.3 steals per game on ridiculous efficiency, shooting 49.5 percent from the field and 47.7 percent from three-point range while averaging 38 minutes per game. Career-wise, Beard, a NAIA National Champion in 2021, is the only player ever with the Shawnee State men's basketball program to win a national tournament game in two separate seasons (2021 and 2024), and is the only player with Shawnee State men's basketball to have posted two seasons above 45 percent from three-point range (50.3 23-24; 47.7 24-25)
The Master's of Business Administration major held a 3.84 GPA as a graduate student at the time of official nomination, and graduated with a 3.58 GPA with a bachelor’s degree in business management in December 2024.
RSC/KIAC MALE ATHLETE OF THE YEAR (SINCE 2009-10)
2009-10 -- Kyle Lenn, IU Southeast -- Baseball
2010-11 -- Jazzmarr Ferguson, IU Southeast -- Men's Basketball
2011-12 -- Marcus Isaac, IU Southeast -- Men's Basketball
2012-13 -- Matt Lowe, Brescia (Ky.) -- Cross Country/Track & Field
2013-14 -- Hank Stewart, Brescia (Ky.) -- Baseball
2014-15 -- Lucas Silva, Point Park (Pa.) -- Men's Soccer
2015-16 -- Willian Paulino, Rio Grande (Ohio) -- Men's Soccer
2016-17 -- Jorge Guinovart, Rio Grande (Ohio) -- Men's Soccer
2017-18 -- Trenton Thompson, Asbury (Ky.) -- Men's Basketball
2018-19 -- Joshua Turnquest, Asbury (Ky.) -- Men's Tennis
2019-20 -- Bishop Smith, IU East -- Men's Basketball
2020-21 -- Matt Monahan, IU Southeast -- Baseball
2021-22 -- Trevor Campbell, IU Southeast, Baseball
2022-23 -- Vilius Labutis, Rio Grande, Men's Soccer
2023-24 -- Cobie Barnes, Saint Mary-of-the-Woods (Ind.), Men's Basketball
2024-25 -- Tre Beard, Shawnee State (Ohio) Men's Basketball