Big South Inducts 2025 Hall of Fame Class
ISLE OF PALMS, S.C. (www.BigSouthSports.com) – The Big South Conference inducted three former student-athletes into its Hall of Fame Thursday night, May 29, during a ceremony as part of the league’s annual Spring Meeting Awards and Hall of Fame Dinner at the Wild Dunes Resort in Isle of Palms, S.C. The inductions increase the Big South’s Hall of Fame membership to 84 former student-athletes, coaches, administrators and contributors.
The 20th Big South Hall of Fame class consists of
Octavia Goode (Winthrop women's track & field),
Phil Leftwich (Radford baseball) and
Mario Williams (Gardner-Webb football). Also elected but requested deferment to the 2026 Class were High Point men’s tennis standout
Chris Archer, former Coastal Carolina baseball head coach
Gary Gilmore, and former UNC Asheville track & field athlete
Natalie Pearson.
OCTAVIA GOODE, Winthrop, Women’s Track & Field, 2000-04
Goode was a 16-time Big South Champion (seven indoor, nine outdoor), as she won the 60m Indoor four times, the 200m Indoor twice and helped Winthrop win the Indoor Distance Medley Relay in 2003. Her nine titles in Outdoor were in the 100m (four), 200m (three) and the 4x100m Relay (two). Goode remains the only 4-time Champion in both the 60m and 100m events in Big South history, and finished her career as a 23-time All-Conference performer in Indoor (10) and Outdoor Track & Field (13). Voted to the Big South 2000-09 All-Decade Teams in both Women’s Indoor Track & Field and Outdoor Track & Field, Goode was a two-time Big South Most Outstanding Indoor Track Performer (2002, 2003) and Most Outstanding Outdoor Track Performer (2003, 2004) for the Eagles. She remains Winthrop’s record-holder for the Indoor 60m (7.43), which was also the Big South record when first set in 2002 and held until 2013. Goode also set Big South records in 100m and 200m (since broken), and was a member of the Winthrop record-holding 4x100m and 4x200m relay teams. She qualified for the 2003 and 2004 NCAA East Regional in the 100m, 200m and a member of the 4x100m team, and qualified for the NCAA Outdoor Track & Field Championships in 2004 in the 100m and finished 17th. Goode was inducted into Winthrop’s Athletics Hall of Fame in 2012.
PHIL LEFTWICH, Radford, Baseball, 1988-90
Leftwich was a two-time All-Conference pitcher for the Highlanders, earning First-Team honors in 1988 and Second-Team recognition in 1989 -- becoming Radford’s first All-Conference pitcher. He set Big South single-season records at the time for complete games in 1988 (9) and 1990 (10), and remains the conference’s all-time leader with 25 career complete games (34 career starts). Leftwich finished his Radford career with a 19-14 record, 3.62 ERA and 234 strikeouts -- which was second-most in Big South history at the time. Voted to the Big South Baseball 1986-89 All-Decade Team, Leftwich was also named to the Big South All-Tournament Team in 1990. He departed Radford with 13 pitching records, including ERA (3.62), wins (19), strikeouts (234), complete games (25), strikeouts per nine innings (7.93), innings pitched (265.2) and batting average against (.243). Leftwich helped Radford's young baseball program reach new heights, leading the Highlanders to their first winning season in 1989, in which he went 7-2 with a league-leading 2.88 ERA for the 27-19 Highlanders that year -- just the program's fifth season of varsity play. He was selected in the 2nd round of the 1990 MLB Draft by the California Angels (64th overall and the organization’s top selection that year), the Big South's third-highest draft pick at the time. Leftwich quickly rose through the Angels’ minor league system, needing less than three full seasons to go through four different levels of the minors to reach the big leagues in 1993 and become the Radford athlete in the major leagues. He made his MLB debut on July 29, 1993 against the Oakland Athletics and posted a career-low 3.79 ERA in 12 starts as a rookie. His first career win came on August 15, 1993 on the road against the Seattle Mariners, and he pitched three seasons for the Angels (1993, 1994, 1996), going 9-17 with a 4.99 ERA in 34 career games (all starts). Leftwich was inducted into the inaugural Radford Athletics Hall of Fame in 1995.
MARIO WILLIAMS, Gardner-Webb, Football, 2002-04
Williams was a heralded four-time All-American and three-time All-Conference performer during the Big South’s first three seasons of sponsoring football, as well as becoming the first two-time Big South Defensive Player of the Year honoree in league history while leading Gardner-Webb to the first two Big South football championships. In 2002, he earned his first Big South Defensive Player of the Year honor along with All-America accolades from
The Sports Network following a season in which he posted a conference-leading 120 tackles (12.00 per game) along with three interceptions and a TD in helping Gardner-Webb to a 9-1 record and a final Top 20 national ranking. Williams repeated as Big South Defensive Player of the Year his junior season of 2003 and earned All-America distinction from the
Associated Press,
The Sports Network and
Weekly Football Gazette. He notched a then-Big South record 70 solo tackles among his 118 total stops, had 7.0 tackles-for-loss, three interceptions, five forced fumbles, four fumble recoveries, and a then-conference mark of 15 pass break-ups. He was a candidate for the Buck Buchanan National Defensive Player of the Year his senior season of 2004, but suffered a season-ending injury five games into the year. Williams still had 61 tackles, two interceptions for 70 yards with a score, and seven PBU to earn All-Big South honors for the third consecutive time. A nine-time Big South Defensive Player of the Week honoree, Williams finished his two-and-a-half seasons in the Big South (27 games) with 326 career tackles, eight interceptions for 117 yards and two touchdowns, 38 passes defended, and seven fumble recoveries/returns -- still tied for the most in Big South football history. He went on to enjoy a successful professional football career in Germany, beginning in NFL Europe with the Frankfurt Galaxy, in addition to a stint in the Arena Football League. Williams was inducted into Gardner-Webb’s Athletics Hall of Fame in 2017.