Norse Report's All-Horizon, All-Defense, All-Freshman, and Individual Awards Picks
We were only SLIGHTLY biased this time!
As our readers will recall, we’ve been releasing our Horizon League Player of the Year rankings each week of the season. Our ‘final 15’ ranked what our metric believed were the 15 players most likely to win the award. We decided to use these rankings as a baseline for our All-League teams, with a few tweaks made manually.
First Team
Antoine Davis, G, Detroit Mercy
Jalen Moore, G, Oakland
Marcus Burk, G, IUPUI
Naz Bohannon, F, Youngstown State
Loudon Love, C, Wright State
Player of the Year: Loudon Love, C, Wright State
Yes, it killed us to do this, but Loudon Love ended up being our player of the year. In all seriousness, there’s really not much left to say - Chris’ metric LOVED LOVE for his efficiency - Love is averaging near 17.5 ppg and 10 rpg in only 28 minutes during conference play. While it was very close, what put Love ahead, and ultimately, first in our rankings was the fact that his team, Wright State is the 2-seed and Loudon is a senior - two data points that our metric uses to weigh the players.
The only player who really posed a threat to Love was Antoine Davis. Despite only showing up in our top 10 a couple of weeks ago after a very slow start to conference play, Davis ripped through Horizon League competition, turning what was previously shaping up to be a 1-man race into a 2-man race with nobody else even close to the two. Given just 1 more week of similar production for Davis and Love - Davis may have gotten him.
Rounding out the top 5, and thus the first team are Naz Bohannen, the versatile Forward from Youngstown State, Jalen Moore, the Guard transfer for Oakland, and Marcus Burk, the 1,000 point scorer (in only 49 games!) from IUPUI. These guys were all very well deserving and we’re proud to make them our official top 10.
Second Team
6. Trevon Faulkner, G, Northern Kentucky
7. Tanner Holden, G, Wright State
8. Marques Warrick, G, Northern Kentucky
9. Elijah Goss, F, IUPUI
10. Dan Oladapo, F, Oakland
Newcomer of the Year: Jalen Moore, G, Oakland
This award does not exist in the HL, but we want to bring it back and give it to a very deserving player. Traditionally “newcomer” is awarded to a player who transferred into the league.
Jalen Moore was a pretty easy decision for the Newcomer Award. For one thing, there’s no such thing as “The Newcomer Award” so we can pick anyone we damn well please and nobody can say boo about it. That’s right, there’ll be no Monday Morning Quarterbacking or “Hey idiots, you said it would be _____ but the league said it would be _______!”
But seriously, the main reason we picked Jalen Moore is pretty simple. They guy was the highest ranked transfer in our metric. He’s the 4th player in the POY race and plays for the 3 seed. Moore averaged a cool 17.8 points per game last year and did so on only 14 shots per game. He’s got some room to grow (who doesn’t) but the sky is the limit for this young man.
Third Team
11. Grant Basile, F, Wright State
12. Teyvion Kirk, G, Illinois-Chicago
13. DeAndre Gholston, G, Milwaukee
14. Adrian Nelson, F, Northern Kentucky
15. Bul Kuol, G/F, Detroit Mercy
Coach of the Year: Dennis Gates, Cleveland State
Honorable Mentions (in order): Darrin Horn, Mike Davis, Will Ryan
This one was really difficult to give out. Gates was great this year, don’t get me wrong, but Cleveland State had two chances to close out Wright State this season down the stretch and become the sole Horizon League regular season champion. They held a 1 game lead in the standings on February 12th, which they would end up relinquishing with a loss to Detroit Mercy. Both Cleveland State and Wright State would eventually win their Saturday night matchups, taking both teams into the final weekend tied in the standings (record-wise). This loss to Detroit Mercy was big, and opened the door for other cases to be made (Greg Kampe, Mike Davis, Will Ryan, etc.)
When Wright State would go on to lose to Northern Kentucky on Friday, February 19th - the NKU win boosted Darrin Horn’s case, but Gates still had a firm grip on the award. Gates, however, would drop a huge loss to a Purdue Fort Wayne team on the tail end of an 8 game losing streak on the exact same night. For the first time in a month, it seemed that the Coach of the Year race had just opened up wide.Had NKU pulled off a Saturday win and CSU lost against to Purdue Fort Wayne - Darrin Horn would be our COTY pick. Honestly, even if NKU had won or CSU had lost, it would have been very close. But as this award is supposed to be awarded to the coach who either best lived up to (or exceeded) expectations, we feel pretty good about our pick.
All Freshman Team
Marques Warrick, G, Northern Kentucky
Kam Farris, G, Robert Morris
Trey Townsend, F, Oakland
Micah Parrish, F, Oakland
Noah Waterman, F, Detroit Mercy
Freshman of the Year: Marques Warrick, G, Northern Kentucky
I mean what else is there to say? Marques Warrick is special. The 7-time Horizon League Freshman of the Week averaged over 17 points per game in conference play, shot over 50% from 2-point range, and shot almost 40% from 3-point range. He screams offensive-efficiency. The only two “freshman flaws” he had in his game this year were turnovers and defensive. If he could just dial back those turnovers a bit - he’d really soar offensively. Once he gets a little more muscle, he’ll be one of the best defenders in the league. You could tell that his main struggles were due to his lack of experience, but that is not a consideration when picking a freshman of the year.
All Defensive Team:
Amari Davis, G, Green Bay
Marcus Burk, G, IUPUI
Michael Akuchie, F, Youngstown State
Grant Basile, F, Wright State
Deante ‘Spider’ Johnson, F, Cleveland State
Defensive POY: Deante ‘Spider’ Johnson, F, Cleveland State
Defensive player of the year was an absolute mess this season. It wasn’t because nobody was particularly deserving, but kind of the opposite. There were MANY players that I considered. Some players that didn’t even make my “all defensive team” above drew some consideration, but ultimately I had to make a tough decision.
I went with Deante ‘Spider’ Johnson because this guy is an absolute FORCE down low. My favorite player in basketball is a long big man who can alter shots inside. I believe if you have one of those, it can throw a team’s entire offensive game plan off - and Johnson was able to do just that for Cleveland State this season. Standing at 6’9” he plays like he’s 7’2” swallowing up the highest block percentage in the league.
The “I Really Wish We Had a 4th Team” Team
Otherwise known as “Honorable Mentions” - The Horizon League added 2 teams this year, making “all-league” selections more difficult than they ever have been…
16. Amari Davis, G, Green Bay
17. Jared Godfrey, G, Purdue Fort Wayne
18. Te’Jon Lucas, G, Milwaukee
19. Josh Jefferson, G, Green Bay
20. Torrey Patton, G, Cleveland State
6th Man: Josh Jefferson, G, Green Bay
Josh Jefferson was pretty much another consensus pick. There wasn’t another 6th man in the league that meant more to his team this year than Josh did to the Phoenix. Averaging “starters minutes” (27.7), Josh was 2nd on his team in scoring, 3rd in assists, 2nd in steals, and 2nd in 3-point percentage. Again, Josh was in a sense anywhere from the second to fourth most important player for Green Bay on a nightly basis, and he didn’t start. You didn’t see alot of that this season in the Horizon League, thus this award was pretty much made for Josh. I’ll be shocked if he does not win it.
Welp, that does it for Norse Report!
What do you think? You agree with what we had to say? Think we’re dumb-asses? Leave a comment below, share with your friends, do whatever you need to do to make yourself feel better about the inevitable disappointment these award projections were!