NEW YORK, May 2, 2007 -- On Wednesday, May 2, Long Island University men’s soccer midfielder sophomore Joshua Merchant, was awarded the Michelle Antoinette Hamdan Memorial Award. After the 2005 season, Merchant was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. The 2005 Second Team All-NEC selection returned to action in 2006, starting 14 games, registering two goals and three assists. The journalism major recorded a 2.7 grade point average and is a member of the University’s Honors Program.

The award has been established in memory of Michelle Antoinette Hamdan, daughter of LIU's former head athletic trainer and former assistant athletic trainer of the New York Knicks, Said Hamdan and his wife, Denise. Their daughter was stricken by an undetected, congenital heart defect and died on Feb. 8, 1991 just days after her birth on Jan. 30, 1991.