Morson Tabbed MAC Freshman of the Year, Second Team; Darrington Named All-Freshman

CLEVELAND — The Mid-American Conference named Madi Morson (Canton, Mich. / Salem) of Central Michigan Women's Basketball as the league's Freshman of the Year and earned a spot on the All-MAC Second Team in its release of annual year-end awards Tuesday morning, voted on by the league's coaches.

The 2024 Michigan Miss Basketball finalist ran away with the award as the season progressed as she posted eight of her 10 20-point games in the final 11 games of the regular season. Her 499 points (16.6 per game) are just eight away from tying the program's freshman record set in 1987-88 by Sue Nissen '91—the program's first Freshman of the Year recipient.

Morson is the third player in program history to achieve both MAC Freshman of the Year and land on an all-conference first or second team in the same season. Presley Hudson '19 collected a second-team nod with her rookie honor in 2016; Nissen remains the only to be named to the league's first team on top of the top freshman laurel.

Ayanna-Sarai Darrington (Lexington, Ky. / Frederick Douglass) joined Morson on the MAC All-Freshman squad. The 2024 Kentucky Miss Basketball finalist found her stride late in the regular season as well, with five of her seven double-doubles in her last eight appearances. She turned back-to-back double-doubles into 20-and-10 games in the first week of February (Ohio, at Marshall), and added a third at Toledo (March 1)

Both players had a signature performance that alerted the nation of their presence:

Morson rattled home 32 points at Dayton (Dec. 15), which stood as the highest mark by any freshman in NCAA I until Jan. 2 and is still one of just eight freshmen to have scored 32-plus in a game this season. The performance still stands in a tie for third in the MAC for single-game points.
Darrington pulled down 21 rebounds in an overtime loss to league champion Ball State (Feb. 26), which remains as the only 20-rebound game by a freshman in NCAA I this season. The outburst tied for sixth all-time at CMU and is still the benchmark for the conference at the end of the regular season.

Central Michigan has had multiple MAC All-Freshman honorees in a season five other times (1990, 2011, 2012*, 2016 and 2023). Crystal Bradford, Jas'Mine Bracey and Jessica Green (2012) remain as one of only two occurrences of a trio of teammates to be named all-freshman in the same season (Kent State, 1991).

Chippewa Women's Basketball, the league's seventh seed, will take on second-seed Toledo Wednesday afternoon in the third MAC Tournament quarterfinal game, which will tip at approx. 4 p.m. ET, or 30 minutes after the conclusion of second quarterfinal matchup.

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