Cullowhee, N.C. – For the third time this season, Western Carolina senior guard Vonterius Woolbright earned weekly plaudits from the Southern Conference, earning the league's Men's Basketball Player of the Week honor for games played Dec. 11-17.
 
Woolbright has a league-best three weekly honors to date this season, the only SoCon player to have received the award on multiple occasions. He collected the conference's first award back on Nov. 13 before repeating on Dec. 4. The conference office selects the SoCon's weekly award winners from nominations submitted by the sports information or media relations personnel at each institution.
 
Woolbright made the most of the one game WCU played following its final exams, scoring in double figures for the 10th time this season and tallying his seventh double-double effort of the year in the 70-53 road win at USC Upstate last Saturday. The Albany, Ga., product nearly posted a triple-double, scoring 15 points accompanied by a career-high tying 16 rebounds and handed out a season-best eight assists. He tied his season-high with 14 defensive boards as the Catamounts won its second in a row to open the year at 8-2 overall.
 
Already a two-time SoCon Player of the Week and the Player of the Month for November, Woolbright continues to lead the conference by averaging a double-double with 21.5 points and 11.8 rebounds per game. He is also third in the league in assists with 5.2 per contest. Woolbright ranks 14th nationally in scoring (21.5 ppg) and ranks fourth in the NCAA in rebounds per game (11.8 rpg), the highest ranking for a player listed as a guard. He is also tied for second nationally with an average of 10.0 defensive rebounds per game.
 
Woolbright continues to inch closer to the 1,000-point milestone in a Catamount uniform, entering the week with 955 points, just 32 shy of climbing into the Top 50 in program history and just 45 shy of 1,000 points during his three seasons in Cullowhee. Additionally, Woolbright has 518 career rebounds to rank 28th in school history while his 324 career assists have him 13th in WCU's history.
 
Western Carolina (8-2) - ranked 12th in this week's Mid-Major Top 25 poll from CollegeInsider.com - hits the road in nonconference play on Tuesday evening, traveling to the Music City to face SEC-foe Vanderbilt (4-6). Tip-off from Vandy's Memorial Gymnasium is scheduled for 7 p.m. ET / 6 p.m. CT in Nashville, Tenn. Tuesday's game will be broadcast on the SEC Network+ (paid subscription required) with live streaming audio from the Catamount Sports Network and live stats available online at CatamountSports.com. Fans locally can also listen to the CSN broadcast on 105.7 FM / 540 AM WRGC, "The River" in Sylva (wrgc.com).
 
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