Albany, NY— The Sage Colleges' department of athletics gathered to recognize and honor the outstanding performances of the 2018-2019 year with the naming of the athletic award winners for the 17 varsity athletic teams. In addition to awarding the Gator Award, for the Most Outstanding Player, the department also named the 2018-2019 Female and Male Rookies of the Year as well as the 2018-2019 Female and Male Athletes of the Year.
Sage honored junior guard Darius Denmark (Orlando, FL/Evans) as the Gator of the Year in men's basketball. A leader on and off the court, Denmark has continued to elevate his game every season with the Gators. This past season, he played in all 25 games while averaging 21.5 minutes a game. He added 57 assists with an impressive 9.0 ppg. He also shot 84.4% from the free throw line and was even more impressive in Empire 8 conference play as he shot 91.4% from the line. He scored in double digits 16 times this year with a personal-best 19 points against SUNY-Polytechnic in 2018-2019.
Head men's basketball coach Brian Barnes noted of Denmark, "Our program has placed an emphasis on embracing self-improvement these last few off season as we continue to chase our first Empire 8 Conference Championship." Barnes added, "Darius carried the torch in that regard from his sophomore to junior year. He has worked tirelessly on developing his perimeter shooting and the results in his play this season showed. Darius tripled his scoring average from a season ago while also making four times as many three point shots as he did last year. He was essentially automatic from the free throw line, only missing three times in all of Empire 8 Conference play. Darius' commitment to developing his skills and strength have set the standard for our younger players to follow. He can often be found in the gym with his head phones in and putting in extra work on the shooting machine. Our coaching staff is proud of the growth in Darius as a student-athlete and look forward to him taking another leap forward this offseason."