TOLEDO, Ohio – University of Toledo men's tennis player Pawit Sornlaksup and women's basketball player Sophia Wiard were selected as recipients of the 2024 MAC Medal of Excellence, as announced by the league office today.
 
The MAC Medal of Excellence is presented annually to one male and one female student-athlete from the graduating class of each of the conference's 12 member institutions. The individuals selected for the award have distinguished themselves academically, athletically, and through demonstrated leadership and service.
 
Sornlaksup and Wiard will be awarded the Medal of Excellence at the 2024 Mid-American Conference Honors Dinner in Cleveland on Thursday, May 30.

Sornlakup was a three-time MAC Player of the Year who made history in 2024 by becoming the first Rocket ever to qualify for the NCAA Men's Tennis Championships as an individual. This season, he also received his third first-team all-MAC selection, a third MAC All-Tournament pick, and won the MAC Tournament MVP for the second time, leading the Rockets to back-to-back MAC Championship Tournament titles. The No. 65 ranked player in the country, Sornlaksup set the school record with an incredible 45-match winning streak at No. 1 singles that stretched over more than two seasons and only lost one conference singles match in his three years. A two-time Academic All-MAC and CSC Academic All-District honoree, Sornlakup graduated with a 3.730 GPA in Information Systems.

Wiard became Toledo's seventh MAC Player of the Year in program history and was a First Team All-MAC selection for the 2023-24 season. She was also named to the Women's College All-Star Game Watch List and was twice named the MAC Female Scholar-Athlete of the Week. The Michigan native helped Toledo to three straight MAC regular-season championships, a MAC tournament title and NCAA Tournament victory in 2023 and a WBIT quarterfinals appearance in 2024. In her final season, she broke two Toledo career records, becoming the all-time program record holder in a games played (157) and minutes (4,957). She also led the league in assist/turnover ratio (2.3) and was fourth in the league in assists (4.6) in 2023-24. Wiard is a two-time CSC Academic All-Distrct and a three-time Academic All-MAC selection. She graduated with a degree in finance and a 3.910 GPA.