When Graves opts for the NBA draft he may not be a first round lock. If he falls to the mid second round his first year of a three year potential deal might be the NBA minimum of about $1.2 million. That is doable for SCU. Most second rounders don’t seem to get guaranteed deals. Maybe a two way G League deal. Sean Farnham thinks another year for guys like Graves may move him up to the first round where he’d get guarantees and a first year deal of around 8-10 M. So waiting a year and blowing up could mean real money.
in any case SCU will have lots of options for next season. For example apparel companies are offering major apparel deals, shoes etc and NIL combo offers for big money…Maybe a source of keeping key players….
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Agree. Graves should only leave if he projects as a 1st round pick. I don’t see the rationale for him if 2nd round as NIL money is there.
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Sendek finally did it: COY in the WCC, his fourth different conference trophy.
Hammond, Mahi, and Graves are all WCC first-teamers with Graves extra notable as a frosh. Graves also takes Freshman of the Year and Sixth Man of the Year in addition to (obviously) a spot on the All-Frosh team.
Ike finally gets his long awaited WCC POY crown. Heimbrodt for Seattle takes Defensive POY and Fuchs from USF gets Newcomer of the Year (i.e. Best Transfer). Both are good picks, and I’m glad that the coaches looked beyond the GU/SMC duopoly.
No real snubs per se. Though I was a bit surprised a Fogle over Gavalyugov on the All-Frosh team. And next year I hope for an Ensminger DPOY as I’ve held onto that prediction since his first year playing. And I’m a little surprised that Oboye didn’t get honorable mention.
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Interesting.
SMC and SCU have three players each on the First Team. Gonzaga with just one (Ike).
USF with three players on the Second Team. No Zags on Second Team.
Makes me wonder what Gonzaga would’ve been without Ike!
Congrats to all
Tremendous for the Broncos!
Fair argument for Bennett, Few or Sendek to be COY. Heck, Smart did a tremendous job in many ways. I think the argument for Sendek lies in the relative finish. Go read a WCC season preview - Few and Bennett did as predicted, Sendek massively exceeded expectations. Gaels and Zags have set themselves a very high bar.
Gerlufsen and Johnson have to be anti-COY.
Allen as 1st Team All-WCC, Freshman of the Year and Sixth Man of the Year is truly awesome stuff. Hype train is still boarding but just about to leave the station for good.
Congrats to Ike. This may be a mid-major league in the national eyes, but the list of West Coast Conference POYs includes some absolute all-time basketball names - Russell, Nash, Cartright & Stockton… and many other impactful names in the history of the game - Rambis, Doug Christie, Rick Adelman, Gathers & Kimble, Mike Brown and all the great recent Zags and Gaels… It’s a big honor.
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Patty Mills played an important role in the rise of SMC and had a long professional career, mostly in the NBA. He even got an NBA championship ring, I believe when he played for the Spurs.
I’d add him to the notables list.
The WCC COY award has, during the reign of Few and Bennett, gone to whichever of those two finished first. Only Stoudamire broke through in recent years for his overachieving Tigers squad in 2019-20. I think that the Loyola loss has left a lingering sour taste in a lot of mouths, including my own (or the second half of the GU game for @buckets ). But I think that Sendek was the clear choice for Coach of the Year this year.
The Three-Man Weave guys predicted that GU would run away with it, USF might be able to edge SMC for second, and there was a large gulf before a muddled mess of SCU, Oregon State, LMU, and Seattle. That was the expectation at the outset, with Santa Clara finishing a distant fourth at best and well outside of any Tournament aspirations. Sendek (with a lot of help from Graves and Hammond) blew right through that and was one game shy of claiming a share of the WCC crown for SCU.
The Broncos are short of the mountaintop yet, but Sendek definitely deserved some laurels for this season.
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The Zags won a lot of in conference games to have only a SINGLE player among the combined (1st and 2nd) 15 All-Conference selections. Few may use that as a little extra motivation for the WCC tournament - I would.
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GU would have had a 2nd in Huff had he not been hurt early in WCC play.
This GU squad is fairly different (not worse) than past teams, 1 selection is a result of depth and no guys besides Ike playing more than 25mins. They’re two deep at the 1 through 4 spots and guys often splitting time equally so aren’t going to put up big #’s consistently.
And they have more than the normal # of athletic, defensive minded guys who aren’t going to put up the offensive #’s that garner more attention. Innocenti and Warley are both NBA caliber defenders for instance, but not huge scorers.
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And no Zags among the additional 8 All Conference Honorable Mentions.
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That part feels like retaliation by the other coaches against GU. That’s fine. GU has never played fair with their conference mates, so no worries about the other coaches being a tiny bit petty on the way out. But even with the injury, Huff should be at least a second team guy. Innocenti and Warley are at least Honorable Mention if not for some epic spite from the rest of the conference.
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Posted this recapping the end of year as well as conference awards and odds at the tournament
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It was 20 years ago SCU had 3 first team WCC honorees. We’ll take it. Now make it rain in Las Vegas!!
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