Few earns top coach honors
Kansas ’Mason is first from school to be player of year
No piece of hardware could take Frank Mason III’s mind off what could have been.
The senior point guard from Kansas received the AP Player of the Year trophy Thursday at the Final Four. He was there without his teammates since the Jayhawks were eliminated in the regional final by Oregon.
I’ve still been thinking about it. It’s been on my mind a lot,” Mason said when asked if he had gotten over that loss. “And I just have to move on to what’s next. And I just look at the bigger picture and focus on everything that I can control.”
Gonzaga coach Mark Few, the AP’s coach of the year, has his team here as the Zags make their first Final Four appearance.
“I don’t know that it really truly sinks in. And again, it’s a credit to this team that God has put me in position to lead,” Few said. “But again, it’s not really about me. I mean, this is about Gonzaga and this year.”
The Zags, who are 361 this season, are in the NCAA tournament under Few for the 18th consecutive year.
Few, who has a career record of 502-112, received 37 votes from the same 65-member national media panel that selects the weekly Top 25.
Sean Miller of Arizona received eight votes while Chris Collins of Northwestern had seven and SMU’s Tim Jankovich got six.
Few, the third-fastest Division I coach to record 500 victories, said the foundation for success was made by players making sacrifices.
“It’s a unique house. I mean, we’re not from the traditional blue-blood deal, but we’ve worked hard to get to this point,” Few said.
Mason received 37 votes, well ahead of Josh Hart of Villanova, who got 16. Caleb Swanigan of Purdue had nine and Lonzo Ball of UCLA had three.
Mason is the firstKansas player to win the award.
TJ Leaf is leaving UCLA for the NBA draft, joining fellow freshman Lonzo Ball in departing after one stellar season with the Bruins. Leaf said through a team spokesman that he plans to hire an agent. The 6-foot-10, 225-pounder from El Cajon, is projected to be a lottery pick in the June 22 draft. Leaf averaged a team-leading 16.3 points and 8.2 rebounds.
Arizona freshman forward Lauri Markkanen is leaving early for the NBA and is expected to hire an agent. Markkanen made the announcement at the school. A 7-footer from Finland, Markkanen averaged 15.6 points and 7.2 rebounds.
NCAA president Mark Emmert says the association’s board of governors will decide by next week whether the repeal of North Carolina’s so-called “bathroom bill” is enough to bring the NCAA basketball tournament and other championship sporting events back to the state. A few hours before Emmert gave his annual pre-Final Four news conference in Arizona, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper signed a bill that rolled back HB2. Emmert says the NCAA delayed its site selection process for the 2018-22 cycle to allow North Carolina lawmakers as much time as possible to address HB2.
Kenrich Williams had 25 points and 12 rebounds, and TCU (24-15) routed Georgia Tech (21-16) 88-56 in the NIT championship in New York.