ATLANTA — As part of its annual Fall Meetings in Atlanta, the Sun Belt Conference formally recognized award winners from the 2024-25 season at the Sun Belt Honors Banquet. 
 
Texas State claimed the league’s highest honor, the Vic Bubas Cup, which is the Sun Belt’s all-sports championship trophy. The Bubas Cup is awarded annually to the top athletics department in the conference based on a points system. The honor is the fourth all-time for the Bobcats, with all four Bubas Cup wins coming since 2019 (2019, 2022, 2024 & 2025). 


 
Texas State, which sponsors 16 of the Sun Belt’s 20 sports, won the Sun Belt women’s indoor and outdoor track & field titles, the men’s outdoor track & field championship and the volleyball tournament crown. The Bobcats were also the softball regular-season champions and tallied top-four league finishes in women’s soccer, football, men’s indoor track & field and women’s tennis. 

The Sun Belt announced its Student-Athletes of the Year—James Madison’s Peyton McDaniel (women’s basketball) and Coastal Carolina’s Caden Bodine (baseball). 

     
 
The conference also acknowledged its previously-announced Postgraduate Scholar-Athletes of the Year—Old Dominion’s Kiersten Donnelly (women’s swimming & diving) and Marshall’s Ethan Bowens (men’s track & field)—and its NCAA Woman of the Year nominees—Coastal Carolina’s Nicolette Picone (softball) and South Alabama’s Delien Kleinhans (women’s tennis). 

     
     
 
Jennifer Schroeder Tyson, a Lecturer in the Departments of Kinesiology and Public Health at App State, was honored as the 2025 Sun Belt Conference Faculty Member of the Year, while each institution’s nominee was also recognized. 
 
     

From the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee, App State received the Community Impact Award. 
 
App State, Arkansas State, Georgia State, Marshall, Old Dominion and South Alabama were recognized with the Student-Athlete Graduation Success Rate Award, bestowed upon any member institution that has a single-year graduation success rate at or above 90 percent for student-athletes as published in the NCAA Division I Graduation Rate Award report. 

     
     
     
 
Georgia Southern faculty athletics representative (FAR) Dr. Chris Geyerman and Old Dominion faculty athletics representative (FAR) Dr. Stacie Raymer were recognized for their service to their respective institutions, the Sun Belt Conference and college athletics ahead of their upcoming retirements.