MSU's Lawrence Roberts Named Wooden Award Top Five National Finalist
STARKVILLE, Miss. -- Mississippi State's Lawrence Roberts has been named a top five finalist for the 28th Annual John R. Wooden Award, which will be announced and presented to the college basketball player of the year next Saturday, April 10, during CBS Sports' telecast of the "John R. Wooden Award Show Presented by Allstate." The show will air live at noon CT from the Los Angeles Athletic Club.
Announced Saturday by the John R. Wooden Award Committee prior to CBS Sports' NCAA Final Four coverage, the top five Wooden Award finalists also include Stanford's Josh Childress, Chris Duhon of Duke, Jameer Nelson of Saint Joseph's, and Connecticut's Emeka Okafor. Roberts becomes Mississippi State's first-ever Wooden Award All-American, which dates back to the 1976-77 hoops campaign.
Recipients of an All-American Team trophy as well as a limited edition All-American Team jacket personalized with individual names and universities, the five finalists and their college coaches will travel to Los Angeles this coming week to participate in a variety of Wooden Award weekend activities. Beginning next Friday evening (April 9), the finalists will serve as honorary coaches at the "After School All-Stars" Basketball Tournament, which is an event featuring player Q&A sessions for youth participants. Next weekend will be highlighted by the 2004 Wooden Award ceremony and subsequent banquet on Saturday. To be held at the Los Angeles Athletic Club, the ceremony will include the presentation of the 2004 Wooden Award All-American Team, the inaugural Women's Wooden Award, and the presentation of the Legends of Coaching Award to Stanford's Mike Montgomery.
The top five finalists will also receive a contribution from the John R. Wooden Award Scholarship Fund in their name to their university's general scholarship fund.
In addition to becoming Mississippi State's first Associated Press All-American First Team selection since Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame member Bailey Howell in 1958-59, Roberts has also garnered first-team all-America recognition this season by both the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) and United States Basketball Writers Association (USBWA) organizations. Along with earning additional first-team national honors this year by the Sports Illustrated.com and CollegeInsider.com websites as well as by the Adolph F. Rupp Award committee, Roberts has also collected second-team all-America accolades by the Basketball Times publication and ESPN.com.
In becoming the first MSU player since Rickey Brown (1979-80) to average a double-double for an entire season, Roberts completed the 2003-04 campaign as the SEC's No. 7 scorer (16.9 ppg) and second-leading rebounder (10.1 rpg) behind LSU's Jaime Lloreda. Roberts also finished the year ranked fifth in the league in field-goal percentage (51.9%). With an SEC-leading 16 double-doubles on the season, the 6-foot-9, 235-pound Roberts ranks fourth nationally among active NCAA Division I players with 38 career double-doubles. The former Baylor transfer and Houston native has averaged 16.3 points (1,400 career points) and 9.5 rebounds (821 career rebounds) per contest during his three-year, 86-game collegiate career.
This season, Roberts helped lead coach Rick Stansbury's eighth-ranked Bulldogs to a 26-4 overall record and league-best 14-2 SEC mark en route to claiming the school's first outright SEC regular-season championship since 1962-63. This year's State squad also made school history by appearing in a fourth consecutive postseason tournament and earning a third straight NCAA Tournament berth.