KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Carson-Newman's men's basketball program has been named a recipient of the National Association of Basketball Coaches' Team Academic Excellence Award and three Eagles have been named to the NABC Honors Court, the organization announced last week.
The NABC Team Academic Excellence Awards recognize men's basketball programs that completed the 2022-23 academic year with a team GPA of 3.0 or higher. The NABC Honors Court, meanwhile, includes junior, senior and graduate student men's basketball players who finished the 2022-23 year with a cumulative GPA of 3.2 or higher.
Carson-Newman finished last year with a 3.17 GPA cumulatively as a team.
Camden McElhaney, Nick Brenegan and Monty Johal were the three Eagles named to the honors court. All three players carry GPAs greater than 3.6.
A CSC Academic All-District selection, McElhaney logged his first career starts in his red-shirt sophomore season. A consummate glue guy, McElhaney has averaged 2.2 points per game on 68.8 percent shooting. He averaged 3.9 rebounds per game. McElhaney had a career game at Catawba when he tallied a career-high 10 points and eight rebounds along with three steals. He had seven games with at least five boards, including a career-high nine at Mars Hill (Feb. 8).
Brenegan was injured for the early portions of the season, but turned it on in the back off of his redshirt-sophomore campaign. The Greenville, S.C.-native scored in double-digits in a career-best seven consecutive games to close the regular season. He averaged 8.3 points per game on 46.6 percent shooting from the field, 40.6 percent shooting from the three and 84.6 percent shooting from the stripe. He had a career-best 23-point effort at Wingate on Feb. 18. Brenegan started the final six games of the season. As a starter, he averaged 16.83 points per game on a 49.2/48.3/85.7 slash line. He averaged 2.5 made threes per game in that stretch. He knocked down a career-best five threes against Wingate (Feb. 18) and had four rebounds on three occassions, at Belmont Abbey (Jan. 4), at Mars Hill (Feb. 8) and against Emory & Henry (Feb. 22). He dished out multiple assists in all six games he started, including a season-high four at MHU, at Wingate and against E&H. Overall, he had seven games where he scored in double figures.
Johal averaged 8.8 points per game on a 46.0/37.7/81.1 slash line. He scored in double-digits 10 times last season with a 17-point game against Lander on New Year's Eve. Johal sank multiple threes in a game eight times last season, with a quartet of games where he buried at least three.
