Bob Jones University celebrated its athletes’ accomplishments this month with the second annual Brody Awards ceremony, which took place at 7 p.m. on April 30 in Rodeheaver Auditorium.

Students can check the online version of this article at collegianonline.com for updated information regarding the winners of the awards.

Jonny Gamet, the assistant athletic director for communications and marketing for the BJU Bruins, believes the Brody Awards event is important for the recognition of BJU athletes.

“Throughout our history, we have had award ceremonies where teams can recognize individual players and their successes over the previous season,” Gamet said.

“Our desire [in creating the Brody Awards] was to have a more athletic-wide focus where we were able to celebrate all of our teams and players at one time rather than multiple events throughout the year. The Brody Awards are a chance for us to look back over the year and celebrate the great things God has done for our teams and student-athletes.”

Daniel Fuller, a junior biblical studies major and president of the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC), which is involved in choosing winners for The Brodys, affirmed the importance of the event. “The Brody Awards started last year as a way to get all the athletes together for a ‘red-carpet’ type event that would connect all the sports together,” Fuller said.

The categories for winners included the Male and Female Student-Athlete of the Year awards, which celebrate the best athletic performance; the Comeback Player of the Year award; the Rookie of the Year award; and the Team of the Year award.

There were also awards for students who best represented the Bruins’ mission, including the Male and Female Heart of the Bruin awards. Other miscellaneous categories included the Coach of the Year award, the most memorable Moment of the Year award, the Scholar-Athlete award and the Brenneman Servant award.

Gamet emphasized that the process for selecting winners is very thorough. “First, we receive nominations from the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee,” he said. “We then have a voting committee made up of coaches, administrators and student-athletes, and we take those nominations and vote on the finalists and the eventual award winners.”

Victoria Glaze, a junior interior architecture and design major and vice president of the SAAC, thinks the SAAC brings an important voice to the decision-making process.

“The SAAC is involved in the awarding process to represent all teams that the Bruins have,” she said. “Because each team has a representative on the committee, it allows more of a spread for the nominations. This year, the Student-Athlete Advisory Committee as a whole was tasked with nominating student-athletes for the awards.”

Glaze also affirmed that the Brody Awards are important to bring all the different sports together.

“In previous years, the fall teams had a banquet after the seasons were complete where each coach would get up and present these awards for each team,” she said. “The same happened for the spring teams. The Brody Awards allows for all the teams to join together and award athletes as a department-wide award rather than team-specific awards. Teams do still have specific awards, [which] are given in individual gatherings.”

“In the future, we see the Brody Awards as something fans, families and other students will be able to come and join and celebrate what has been accomplished with Bruin athletics,” Glaze said.