BRENTWOOD, Tenn. – Freshman Zoe Best of Southeast Missouri Women's Basketball became the second player in program history to take home the Ohio Valley Conference 'Freshman of the Year', after the league announced its postseason awards on Tuesday. 
 
Best joins former Redhawk Tesia Thompson (2017-18) as the only two players to win the award. 
 
The freshman from Bel-Nor, Missouri, Best was also selected to the OVC's All-Newcomer team and was an All-OVC Second Team selection. She is the 11^th Redhawk to be named to the All-Newcomer team and the 13^th Redhawk to land on the second team. 
 
The 2024-25 season marks the second-straight year a Redhawk Women's Basketball player was named to the second team following Alecia Doyle (2023-24) a season ago. 
 
Zoe played and started in all 29 games this season for head coach Briley Palmer in her first season. She averaged 34.0 minutes-per-game which ranked her third in the OVC. 
 
She finished the season with a 14.0 PPG average, scoring 405 points on the season. She finished sixth overall in scoring in the conference and finished the year with 21 games of 10 or more points. Of those 21 games, six of them saw Best score north of 20 points including a season-high 25 points in the season opener at Dayton (11/5). 
 
Best was also the top rebounder for the Redhawks from her guard position as she averaged 5.1 RPG. In 29 games, Best hauled in 148 rebounds including 101 on the defensive end and 47 on the offensive end. She ranked 19^th in the conference in rebounds and recorded a season-high 13 rebounds against SIUE (12/21). 
 
On the season, Zoe finished 141-386 from the field for an overall shooting percentage of 36.5-percent. She was deadly from three-point range knocking down 70-of-199 three pointers (35.2%). Best finished second in the league in three-point-field-goals-per-game with 70, averaging 2.4 per game. 
 
Best was deadly at the free throw line as well. She finished 53-63 at the line for an 84.1-percent mark on the season.

In addition to her scoring, Best dished out 60 assists, recorded 10 blocks, and swiped 37 steals on the season.