By Brenda June Temple

Catamount senior earns his second monthly award to accompany four weekly honors

Cullowhee, N.C. – For the second time this season, Western Carolina senior guard Vonterius Woolbright collected monthly honors from the league office today as he was named the Southern Conference Men’s Basketball Player of the Month for December. Woolbright collected both of the conference’s monthly awards handed out at present in the 2023-24 season.

Woolbright became just the fourth WCU men’s basketball player to collect monthly plaudits from the SoCon after earning the award back in November. He now holds the distinction as the only Catamount in program history to earn multiple monthly honors from the league office. Woolbright is just the 14th player in SoCon history to be a repeat winner of the Player of the Month award that has been handed out since the 2004-05 season.

Averaging a double-double in December with 22.7 points and 12.6 rebounds per game, Woolbright posted a combined six double-doubles in leading the Catamounts to a 5-2 monthly record. The Albany, Ga., product scored 20 or more points in five of those seven games including a career-high 35 points at Gardner-Webb. He also added 4.6 assists per game in the month while shooting 51.8% from the field.

Woolbright collected three of the four SoCon Player of the Week awards handed out in December including back-to-back honors on Dec. 18 and 26. With four weekly honors earned to date this season, he is just the second Catamount men’s basketball player to secure four or more weekly conference awards in the same season, joining former WCU standout Frankie King who collected weekly plaudits four times in the 1993-94 season.

Woolbright opened December with a career-best 35 points and 14 rebounds in the road loss at Gardner-Webb, followed by a 25-point, seven-rebound effort in the defeat at High Point. It was the only game in the month in which he did not collect double-figure rebounds and the only two defeats suffered by the Catamounts this season.

In an early December showdown between two conference preseason players of the year, Woolbright outplayed the Big South preseason favorite, Drew Pember, with 23 points and 10 rebounds in the 78-63 home win over UNC Asheville. Woolbright matched a then career-high with 16 rebounds to accompany 15 points in a road win at USC Upstate as he just missed a triple-double with eight assists.

At Vanderbilt, Woolbright scored WCU’s final four points including the game-winning bucket with 1.5 seconds remaining in regulation in lifting the Catamounts to their second victory over a Power Five Conference opponent – the first SoCon school to win twice against a P-5 since the 2017-18 season. Woolbright closed the month by setting a career-high with 17 rebounds while scoring 16 points in the win over Brescia and finished with 23 points and 10 boards against King University.

During the month, Woolbright became the 49th Catamount men’s basketball player to crest the 1,000-career point plateau in a WCU uniform. He also collected a weekly honor from the United States Basketball Writers Association (USBWA) with the Oscar Robertson Player of the Week award on Dec. 27.

Woolbright continues to pace the Southern Conference with a double-double including 21.3 points and 12.3 rebounds per game, ranking ninth and third in the NCAA collectively. He is just one of three SoCon players to rank inside the Top 10 in the conference in both scoring and rebounding – and is the only player to rank among the Top 10 in scoring, rebounding, and assists at 5.1 per game. He also leads the nation in defensive rebounds per game, the only player averaging double-figures at 10.21 defensive boards per game, while also matching Akron’s Enrique Freeman for the most recorded double-doubles in the nation with 11.

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COURTESY WESTERN CAROLINA ATHLETIC COMMUNICATIONS