Nabbing 15 of a 25 first place votes, the Aggies were picked as the favorite to win the conference by the media, with New Mexico State, Denver, Louisiana Tech and Idaho rounding out the top half of the projected standings.
The coaches left me scratching my head a little bit, but since five of them are total n00bs to this whole WAC thing, I suppose I can give them a bit of a pass on duffing this one. Utah State and New Mexico State shared the first place votes at an even 5-5 split, but at some point on another coach's ballot, they put USU a notch lower than the bad Aggies. So technically, NMSU gets the nod as the favorite in the coaches poll, but like I said, n00bs all over this bitch.
It's pretty much tradition at this point for a Utah State player to be picked as the WAC's preseason Player of the Year, with five of the last six preseason polls giving that nod to an Aggie by either the coaches or the media. This year's guy was the no-brainer pick with Preston Medlin getting the nod by both the coaches and media as preseason Player of the Year.
Medlin joins Brockeith Pane, Tai Wesley, Gary Wilkinson and Jaycee Carroll as USU players to earn preseason POY honors, and all of them but Pane went on to get the same honor at season's end.
Also, Medlin is the first POY selection to be picked by both coaches and media since the 2009-10 season when Luke Babbitt was the easy pick that year. In eight years in the WAC for USU, the coaches and media have agreed on a POY with only Medlin, Babbitt, Carroll and Nick Fazekas. Each of the previous three won the award to finish the season too.
Jarred Shaw was picked as the Newcomer of the Year by the media while Kyisean Reed was named to the all-WAC second team, giving USU some more love from the pollsters.
If I were to make a bold prediction, I'd say that all three of Medlin, Shaw and Reed will find their way among the two all-WAC teams at the end of the season.
The rest of the first team consisted of Louisiana Tech sophomore Raheem Appleby, Idaho senior Kyle Barone, NMSU sophomore Daniel Mullings and Denver junior Chris Udofia.
IF IT WERE MY BALLOT...
With so many new teams in the conference, it's a bit tougher to accurately pick things. There's a ton of unknowns, but still plenty that can be gathered from which teams have plenty returning. Here's what I think.
Utah State appears to be the clear No. 1 right now. With the preseason Player of the Year, Newcomer of the Year and the best coach in the conference, how do you argue otherwise? Even in replacing the second-leading scorer in Pane, Tenale Roland was a JUCO All-American, and that's proved to be a big deal in the past. With Reed and Berger looking like a big leap forward is in the cards, as is the case for most of Stew's JUCO transfers in their second season, that only adds to the hype.
Denver would be No. 2 in my book. Chris Udofia is probably the most likely candidate to give Medlin a run from Player of the Year, and they're a team that returns a lot from a solid season last year. Difficult to find recruiting info on them, but chances are that if the names of their recruits are hard to find, they probably aren't big names by any means. Still, the same has often been said about some of USU's players in the past, but with a good coaching staff like Denver has, talent will develop and they'll be competitive.
Despite losing so much from last year, New Mexico State still is worthy of being a top three team. They've still got to come together and prove it all though, and that's always been a tough task for the bad Aggies. Marvin Menzies is going to have to help his guys adjust to much bigger roles than they're used to, while bringing along new guys into the now vacated supporting roles. They could finish as high as second or third, but possibly as low as sixth or seventh.
Louisiana Tech didn't shock a ton of people when they beat Utah State in the first round of the WAC Tournament. When they beat Nevada in the semifinals though, the shocker was delivered. They return a lot from that team, including last year's Freshman of the Year. They've probably got the potential to make the biggest leap forward from this spot, and I really can't imagine them slipping lower.
As for everyone else... Sorry, just don't think there's any hope of a WAC title for you this season.
If you want to see the full polls and all-WAC teams, head here: http://www.utahstateaggies.com/sports/m-baskbl/spec-rel/102412aab.html
You are a complete moron. I can't believe anyone would allow you to share your writing with the public.
ReplyDeleteif your going to condemn the writer you need to state for what reasons he has off base or all of the rest of us will just thing douche bag that doesn't even have the balls to associate an internet username to his comment.
DeleteHAHA, blueshadows followed here.
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