SPARTANBURG, S.C. – VMI football player Collin Ironside has been named the Southern Conference Student-Athlete of the Week for all competition from Sept. 14-20. The selection is made by the conference office.
 
In VMI’s 28-22 loss to Cornell on Saturday, Sept. 17, Ironside entered the contest in the third quarter and went 16-for-18 with one passing touchdown and a career-high 275 yards, helping lead a 20-0 run for the Keydets. The redshirt sophomore quarterback connected on a 41-yard pass to Leroy Thomas, setting up a Hunter Rice 1-yard touchdown run before connecting on a 3-yard touchdown pass to Chance Knox that cut VMI’s deficit to 28-16. Ironside scrambled in for his first career rushing touchdown to make it a one-possession game with five seconds remaining, but Cornell recovered the onside kick to clinch the contest.
 
The Knoxville, Tennessee, native maintains a 4.00 grade point average and is majoring in business and economics.
 
VMI (1-2-0, 0-0-0 SoCon) has an early bye and returns to the field on Saturday, Oct.1, traveling to Cullowhee, North Carolina, to open SoCon play against Western Carolina (2-1-0, 0-0-0 SoCon).
 
Also nominated for Student-Athlete of the Week: Evan Guzman (ETSU men’s cross country), Brianna Teegarden (Mercer’s women’s cross country), Reuben Lowery III (Chattanooga football), Chandler Smith (Samford football), Richard McCollum (Western Carolina football) and Bella Zeman (Wofford volleyball).

SoCon Student-Athletes of the Week
Sept. 7       Abigail Robertson, Sr., Furman women’s cross country
Sept. 14     Chandler Martin, R-Fr., LB, ETSU football
Sept. 21     Collin Ironside, R-So., QB, VMI football