Sparkill, N.Y. - St. Thomas Aquinas College Men's Basketball player James Patterson has been selected to the Bevo Francis Award Top 50 Watch List, as announced on Thursday by Small College Basketball and the National Awards Committee.
Patterson (Richmond, Va.) leads the East Region, the East Coast Conference and the Spartans in points per game with 24.4, while also sitting third in Division II in scoring. The sophomore guard/forward also averages 8.8 rebounds per game. Patterson paces a Spartans' offense that averages 90.8 points per game and leads St. Thomas Aquinas College in minutes played per game with 28.1.
On the defensive side of the ball, Patterson has 202 rebounds, 40 steals and four blocks in 23 games on the year. In his two-year Spartan career to date, Patterson has accumulated 994 points, 414 rebounds, 64 assists, 84 steals and seven blocked shots.
James Patterson is the fourth Spartan to headline the Bevo Francis Award Top 100 Watch List, with Justin Reyes (2016-17 & 2017-18), Osbel Caraballo (2021-22) and Demetre Roberts (2021-22) all being selected in previous seasons. Patterson and Reyes are the only two Spartans to advance to the Top 50 Watch List, with Reyes advancing the furthest in the awards voting, making the Top 10 Finalists List in both years that he was nominated.
The Clarence “Bevo” Francis Award is presented annually to the player who has had the finest overall season within Small College Basketball. Considerations will be season statistics and individual achievements, awards, personal character and team achievements. This is an incredibly prestigious award, as this award will only be given to one player within Small College Basketball per season.
2024 marks the eighth year of the Bevo Francis Award. Past winners include Dominez Burnett of Davenport University in 2016, Justin Pitts of Northwest Missouri State University in 2017, Emanuel Terry of Lincoln Memorial University in 2018, Aston Francis of Wheaton College in 2019, Kyle Mangas of Indiana Wesleyan University in 2020 and Trevor Hudgins of Northwest Missouri State University in 2022. In 2023, RJ Sunahara of Nova Southeastern was named the winner of the Bevo Francis Award. The award was not presented during the 2021 season.
On March 15th, the Top 25 players will be announced. On April 5th, the finalists of this year’s award will be announced, followed by the Bevo Francis Award winner being crowned on April 8th.