Western Illinois Moving Up
(St. Louis, MO) – Outstanding week seven performers are creating momentum for their teams as Ohio Valley Conference teams head into conference play. Western Illinois’ women’s team has been the OVC’s best all season and the Leathernecks’ men’s team has won four straight.
Two of the WIU players were OVC honorees on Wednesday.
Week Seven Players of the Week
Morehead State came oh so close to upsetting Indiana and one reason was the explosive scoring of Jordan Lathon. The 6’5 guard scored 30 points during the team’s one point loss to their Big Ten foe. This week’s men’s ‘Player of the Week’ added 18 points during a victory over coach Preston Spradlin’s alma mater, Alice Lloyd College.
UT Martin’s Anaya Brown is the women’s ‘Player of the Week’. The sophomore forward scored 18 points and grabbed seventeen rebounds during the Skyhawks’ victory over Arkansas State. Her 17-rebound performance is tied for the most by any OVC player this season. Brown’s week seven award gives the Skyhawks back-to-back weekly winners of this honor.
Newcomers of the Week
Western Illinois’ men’s team swept its two games and UMSL transfer Drew Cisse was a big factor in those wins. The 6’11 senior scored 28 points and grabbed 28 rebounds during the Leatherneck victories. His 17-rebound performance against Central Arkansas was his third of 17 or more this year and is currently fourth nationally in rebounds averaging 12.2 per game. Cisse’s ‘Newcomer of the Week‘ award is the first weekly honor for any Leatherneck men’s player this season.
Two women share the ‘Newcomer of the Week’ award. Little Rock’s Leilani Wimbish-Gay and Eastern Illinois’ Charita Lewis were honored this week. Wimbish-Gay averaged 13 points and five rebounds for the Trojans and Lewis averaged 14.5 points, three rebounds, three assists and 3.5 steals.
Week Seven Freshman Winners
Western Illinois’ Raegan McCowan and Tennessee State’s Jaylen Jones are distancing themselves from the other OVC first-year players. McCowan who shared the week one ‘Player of the Week’ award has now received five of the first seven ‘Freshman of the Week’ awards. The 5’11 guard scored 30 points during WIU’s easy win over Cornell College.
Jones has now claimed three ‘Freshman of the Week’ awards. The TSU rookie scored 16 points during the Tigers’ loss to Indiana State. Little Rock’s Jaylen Crocker-Johnson owns two of the weekly awards.
Week seven is the final week of the non-conference schedule. These weekly awards will be particularly telling heading into 2024.
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Editor: Cover photo of Raegan McCowan courtesy of goleathernecks.com.
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As we near the closing of the portal window, we've reached 1900. Some of them never to play college basketball again, earn a college degree and some to play at a much lower level than they did last season.
I guess we'll be seeing this in a @RacersHoops uniform this year. Glad AJ is staying in the @ValleyHoops.
