General | 6/12/2023 12:24:50 PM
The Empire 8 is well represented with four award winners who will be honored at the Rochester Press-Radio Club's Celebration of Champions, presented by ESL Federal Credit and held at Innovative Field, home of the Rochester Red Wings on June 13, 2023. Retired Nazareth University Sports Information Director Joe Seil, Nazareth women's hockey head coach Chris Baudo, Daniel Cook of St. John Fisher University and Rochester Institute of Technology men's basketball coach Bob McVean will be honored.
Seil will be honored with the Morrie Silver Award. Seil retired in 2022 after spending 36 years as the Sports Information Director at Nazareth. He was part of four National Championship teams and more than 60 Empire 8 titles. Seil is the longest serving Sports Information Director in league history. During that time Nazareth athletics has grown from 13 to 26 sports.
Seil has been an active member of both College Sports Communicators and EAST-COMM (formerly ECAC-SIDA). He has been suitably honored for his efforts on a local and national basis. He is a past recipient of the Charlie Wagner Award from the Rochester Press-Radio Club. He will also be honored later this week by CSC with the Lifetime Achievement Award.
Baudo is the 2021-22 ESL Press-Radio Coach of the Year. That season, Baudo, who was named the 2021-22 UCHC Coach of the Year earlier and was a finalist for Division III Women’s CCM/AHCA Coach of the Year Award after leading the Golden Flyers to their first UCHC Championship in program history. Baudo led the Golden Flyers to a 27-2-0 overall record, while advancing to the NCAA Quarterfinals. Nazareth earned 59 of a possible 60 points in league play to earn the UCHC Regular Season title.
Last season, Baudo led the Golden Flyers to their second straight UCHC Championship. He has led the team to a 94-20-6 (.808 win percentage) record including an impressive 68-8-4 (.897) record in UCHC games, while starting the program from scratch in 2018.
Cook will be honored as the winner of the Rich Funke Jr. College Male Award. Cook, who was named the Empire 8 Player of the Year for the third straight season in 2022-23, averaged 18.3 points and 9.0 boards to go along with 3.3 assists, 1.5 steals and 0.9 blocks per contest, while shooting 53.4 percent from the floor, third highest in the league. Cook scored in double figures in 27 of 29 games played this season and recorded nine double-doubles. Cook is the first three-time Empire 8 Men’s Basketball Player of the Year. He has scored 1,340 points and pulled down 677 rebounds, while shooting 53.3 percent from the floor in three seasons at St. John Fisher.
Cook was also named the 2023 Empire 8 Championship Tournament Most Valuable Player, as he led the fourth-seeded Cardinals to the Empire 8 title. He averaged 17.2 points, 9.4 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game, while shooting 56 percent from the floor in five postseason games, as the Cardinals advanced to the second round of the 2023 NCAA Division III Men's Basketball Tournament. Most recently, Cook was a 2023 National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) Second Team All-America selection and D3hoops.com Fourth Team All-American.
McVean, who was a member of the Empire 8 with RIT from 1999-2011 will be honored with the Charlie Wagner & Christine Wagner Welch Founder Award. McVean was the inaugural Empire 8 Men's Basketball Coach of the Year in 1999-00 and led the Tigers to two league titles in 2000 and 2009. He will enter his 40th year at RIT in 2023 and has 599 career victories. In his 12 seasons as a member of the Empire 8, McVean recorded 188 wins and coached All-E8 first team selections, seven second team picks, a two-time Player of the Year and two Rookies of the Year.
ABOUT THE EMPIRE 8 CONFERENCE
The members of the Empire 8 Conference are committed first and foremost to the pursuit of academic excellence and the league is regarded as an outstanding NCAA Division III conference. The membership has distinguished itself among its peer group for its quality institutions, spirited and sportsmanlike competition, outstanding services and highly ethical policies and practices. Its commitment to serve the educational needs of its student-athletes is the hallmark of the E8. For more on the Empire 8 visit
www.empire8.com.
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