Joe Mitch

SiriusXM, CBSSports.com partner with USBWA awards

By JOE MITCH
USBWA Executive Director
mitch@usbwa.com

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The USBWA is getting some valuable national exposure on SiriusXM satellite radio and CBSSports.com.

SiriusXM Radio is exclusively announcing the USBWA's Oscar Robertson Player of the Week selection each Tuesday on "Inside College Basketball," co-hosted by Jason Horowitz and Bruce Pearl on the College Sports Nation channel. The finalists and winner of the Oscar Robertson Trophy for national player of the year will also be announced on SiriusXM. This is the fifth season that the USBWA has selected a national player of the week.

The USBWA's Tisdale Award for the national freshman of the year is being featured on CBSSports.com by USBWA member Jeff Borzello through his popular on-line column that spotlights the nation's top freshman. Each Tuesday, Borzello profiles a freshman of the week in addition to his weekly freshman watch. The Oscar player of the year and Tisdale freshman of the year awards, along with the Henry Iba Coach of the Year, the Ann Meyers Drysdale women's Player of the Year and the women's freshman and coach of the year awards, are all voted on by the USBWA membership at the end of the regular season.

Here is the schedule of announcements for the various USBWA awards this year:

• March 11: All-District teams
• March 12: All-America teams
• March 17: Wayman Tisdale Freshman of the Year
• March 24: Henry Iba Coach of the Year
• March 31: Women's All-America team
• April 4: Oscar Robertson Player of the Year
• April 8: Women's Player and Coach of the Year

The Tisdale, Iba and Oscar awards will be presented to the winners at a College Basketball Gala in Oklahoma City on April 14. The women's awards will be presented at the women's Final Four in Nashville, Tenn.

The USBWA player of the week selections are handled by the USBWA district representatives. Each week, a different district rep is responsible for reviewing the player of the week winners for each Division I conference and selecting an overall winner from that list. Mel Greenberg, the USBWA's coordinator for women's basketball, selects the women's national player of the week.

WELCOME TO THE BOARD: Kevin Brockway of the Gainesville Sun is the newest USBWA district representative and board member. He represents District IV, which is comprised of Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Florida. Kevin replaces Brendan F. Quinn, who left the Knoxville News-Sentinel to cover Michigan for MLive.com.

Other new board members this year are John Bohnenkamp, the Burlington (Iowa) Hawk Eye; Randy Rosetta, New Orleans Times-Picayune/NOLA.com; Robert Gagliardi, Wyoming Tribune Eagle; Bruce Pascoe, Arizona Daily Star; Brian Morrison, ACC; and Chris DiSano, College Chalktalk.

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE 2014 HALL OF FAME CLASS: It's great to see the selection of Dick Jerardi, Philadelphia Daily News; George Lapides, formerly with the Memphis Press-Scimitar; and Robyn Norwood, formerly with the Los Angeles Times, to the USBWA Hall of Fame.

Jerardi and Norwood are veteran writers and long-time members of the organization who were terrific as presidents of the USBWA. Norwood is the first woman to ever serve as USBWA president.

I first came to know Lapides when George was sports editor of the Press-Scimitar and I was assistant commissioner of media relations for the old Metro Conference from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s. Lapides is a legend in the Memphis area and a respected print journalist and a radio talk show host. His radio show, now in its 42nd year, is the longest-running sports radio program in the nation, and, it's been claimed, the second-longest in the country behind the Grand Ole Opry.

The USBWA now has 68 members in its Hall of Fame, which was first established in 1988 to honor past and present members for their achievements in sports journalism covering college basketball or for their contributions to the USBWA. To be eligible for consideration, an individual must have worked a minimum of 20 years as a sportswriter or college athletics administrator.

RECORD NUMBER OF WRITING CONTEST ENTRIES: The USBWA received 179 entries in this year's writing contest, the most ever in USBWA history. The contest is sponsored by the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.