Mitchell, Smith Earn Blackburn Player of the Week Honors

CARLINVILLE, IL -- Blackburn College continues their annual Players of the Week for the 2025-26 season with Volleyball's Zoe Mitchell and Men's Soccer Brayden Smith earning the award for opening week. 

Mitchell, a senior, helped guide the volleyball team to a 3-1 opening weekend with wins over Miami University Hamilton, Sturgeon College and Beloit College. She paced the offense with 24 kills and added six aces. Defensively she notched six blocks. Mitchell posted nine kills in the wins over Miami Hamilton and Sturgeon and posted four aces against Beloit. Against Franklin, she tallied four blocks. 

A sophomore, Smith scored the game-winning goal in the team's win over Buena Vista University. In the win, Smith used his left foot and booted a deflected save into the bottom left corner of the net for his first goal of the season. He totalled three shots on the weekend. 

This week, the action gets started with the Women's Soccer team as they head to University of Health Sciences and Pharmacy Tuesday night. Men's Soccer is in action Wednesday with a match at Concordia University Chicago. 

On Friday, both Men and Women's Cross Country teams head to the University of Illinois Springfield Hy-Vee Prairie Stars Invitational while both Men and Women's Golf start their fall season with dual matches against Eureka College. 

Saturday sees volleyball take on Concordia Chicago with Women's Soccer heading to Stephens College and the Men's Soccer team heading to UHSP.