NEW YORK (May 7, 2021) – For the seventh time in eight years, Oklahoma Christian athletic administrator Murray Evans received recognition Friday in the College Sports Information Directors of America's annual Fred W. Stabley Sr. Writing Contest.

Evans, OC's assistant athletic director for communications/sports information director, won a first-place award in CoSIDA's District 6 – which includes universities and colleges of all sizes in Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi – in the event coverage category for 2020.

The award-winning story was about Oklahoma Christian's men's basketball team upsetting a Dallas Baptist (Texas) team then ranked in the top 10 in NCAA Division II on Jan. 11, 2020.

The CoSIDA writing contest received more than 500 submissions across eight districts in seven categories. All submissions had to be published for the first time during the 2020 calendar year. As a district winner, Evans' story advanced into competition for national honors in the event coverage category. Committees of CoSIDA members judge the district and national portions of the contest.

Evans has won 19 first-place district awards in the contest since 2013.

Evans has handled OC's sports information duties since August 2011. His responsibilities include creating content for and maintaining the university's athletic website, producing news releases, serving as the official scorer and statistician for OC athletics, overseeing game operations at OC home events, maintaining historical records for OC's 17 varsity and six club sports, overseeing athletic social media accounts, handling award nominations, serving on OC's Athletic Hall of Fame committee and answering media queries. He's also a contributing writer for the Christian Chronicle, which is published on OC's campus.

Evans graduated from OC in 1989 with a degree in journalism. Starting in 1988, he spent 23½ years as a sports and news reporter, including 13 with The Oklahoman in Oklahoma City (spending much of that time as the newspaper's small-college beat writer) and more than eight with The Associated Press in Lexington, Ky., and Oklahoma City. He won numerous writing awards for his work with The Oklahoman and the AP.

Last year, he won first place in sports reporting in the annual Society of Professional Journalists-Oklahoma Pro Chapter's annual writing contest for a Christian Chronicle story about the memorial service for a former high school football coach and church elder in Tulsa. In 2014, he also received a first-place award in press release writing from SPJ Oklahoma for his work at OC.