OVC & MVC Represented Among Durham Finalists

Editor: The following is part of a press release from hughdurhamaward.com. Ohio Valley Conference coaches Rick Byrd (Belmont) and Matt McMahon (Murray State) are finalists. The Missouri Valley Conference is represented by Drake head coach Darian DeVries.

(Boston, MA) – The finalists for the 2019 Hugh Durham Award were announced on Friday.

The Hugh Durham Award is presented annually to the nation’s top mid-major coach.  In eight seasons as the head coach at Jacksonville University, Durham became the Dolphins’ all-time winningest Division I coach (106 wins), making him the only coach in NCAA history to be the winningest coach (pct. or wins) at three different Division I schools.

He built national programs at Florida State where he holds the record for best winning percentage and at Georgia where he is also the all-time winningest coach of the Bulldog program.

The recipient of the 2019 Hugh Durham award will be announced on April 5 at the College Insider Awards Event, in Minneapolis, site of the 2019 NCAA division I basketball championship.

Editor: Byrd and McMahon’s teams tied for the OVC regular season championship and Murray State prevailed in the conference tournament. DeVries led the Bulldogs to an MVC co-championship with Loyola, while the conference tournament was won by Bradley.