DURANT – Following the conclusion of the 202324 sports seasons Southeastern Athletics has named its Male and Female Athletes of the Year with Macayla Needham and D’Nari Mills sharing the women’s honor while Brennen Burns earned the honor on the mens side.

Needham, a senior from Eufaula, transferred into the Savage Storm track and field program and made an immediate impact, winning a pair of Great American Conference Championships, one in the shot put and another in the hammer throw The season culminated with her earning a bid to the NCAA National Championship meet, the first in SE program history, her season with the Storm she has collected school records in both the shot put and the hammer throw and owns at least the five best throws in both events in school history.

“ I was very honored to receive this award. Every single day that I passed the wall going to the weight room I kept saying I was going to work as hard as I could to make it up there too. This has made me feel so proud of everything I’ve accomplished this year and it shows that hard work and determination really does take you where you want to be. My coaches are extremely proud of this achievement and have been so much help in getting me to where I needed to be to get it,” Macayla Needham-Peterson said.

Mills, a sophomore from Cypress, Texas, joined an elite group in SE volleyball history after earning All-Central region honors, becoming just the third player to do so in the sport and joining Olivia Franceskini and Lunden Azuara.

She was the most dominant offensive player in the Great American Conference on the season, becoming the third Savage Storm player to take home conference Player of the Year honors, ending the season as the national leader in total kills while ranking fourth in kills per set and seventh in points per set.

Mills’ 4.75 kills per set which lead the league by nearly a full kill per set and is the SE record for kills per set for a season.

She has also been second on the team in digs with 2.65 digs per set along the back row while picking up 39 total blocks while playing at the net.

Burns, a junior from Bethany, was unanimous first team All-Great American Conference selection after ranking eighth in the league in scoring at 16.8 points per game while ranking fifth in shooting percentage at 55.7 percent.

He was also the GAC’s most prolific distributor, dishing out 6.8 assists which led the conference and ranked second in the nation in assists per game.