ROCHESTER, NY - The Utica University Pioneers have achieved a fifth-place finish in the final Empire 8 Commissioner's Cup rankings of the 2024-2025 academic year.
 
Commissioner Cup points are awarded based on each team's regular season and postseason results. A team's regular-season finish and postseason finish will be added together. That total is then divided by two for the final score for that sport. The Commissioner's Cup is contested between all 12 full-time members of the Empire 8 Athletic Conference.
 
This year, the Pioneers had a raucous winter, with men's basketball taking home a second-consecutive Empire 8 Tournament Championship, and men's hockey capturing the UCHC regular season conference crown.
 
The track and field team also contributed heavily to the Pioneers' placement among the conference's elite, presenting an individual Empire 8 Indoor Champion (Hunter Logan, Shot Put), and a flurry of top finishers in the Empire 8 Outdoor Championships (Hunter Logan, Shot Put - Ellis Urgent, Long Jump - Louis Pinto, High Jump - Stefania Grimaldi, Heptathlon). This group of five track and field champions helped propel the Pioneers into the top half of the rankings.
 
In the spring, three out of four team sports cracked the Empire 8 postseason, with softball advancing to the penultimate round of the Empire 8 Softball Championships.
 
The Pioneers were rewarded for a spectacular academic year with a composite score of 0.529. They grabbed 104.75 of a possible 198 points.
 
You can find the full 2024-2025 rankings, along with the conference's official release here: Empire 8 Final Commissioner's Cup Release