Wilson headlines AP All-America team

NEW YORK — A’ja Wilson is now part of an elite women’s basketball group.

South Carolina’s senior center became the seventh player Monday ever to earn Associated Press All-America team honors three times. She was a unanimous choice from the 32-member national media panel that votes on the AP Top 25 each week. Wilson was joined on the All-America team by UConn’s Katie Lou Samuelson, Oregon’s Sabrina Ionescu, Louisville’s Asia Durr and Mississippi State’s Victoria Vivians. Voting was done before the NCAA Tournament.

Wilson is the seventh player to be a three-time All-American. Baylor’s Brittney Griner, Tennessee’s Chamique Holdsclaw, Duke’s Alana Beard, Oklahoma’s Courtney Paris and UConn’s Breanna Stewart and Maya Moore are the only other players to earn firstteam honors at least three times.

Paris and Moore were All-Americans all four years.

“Those six others to be listed with them is amazing,” Wilson said . “To be in that list of names, so now with years to come when young girls are growing up and they want this and see my name in that name book it’s something special. Something I dreamed of, but never would have imagined.”

Wilson averaged 22.6 points, 11.8 rebounds and 3.2 blocks this season for the Gamecocks and has them in the regional finals Monday night, a year after winning the school’s first national championship.

Samuelson earned AllAmerica honors for the second consecutive season averaging 17.9 points, shooting 44 percent from behind the arc. Coach Geno Auriemma has been impressed how the junior forward has been able to improve aspects of her game every season.

“The thing about Lou is that she’s been able to, each and every year add something to her game,” he said. “When you do as many things well as she does, it’s not so much the numbers it’s how she just breaks games wide open with 3s and she’s one of the best passers on our team and one of the best ball handlers on our team. So, I’m not surprised that she would be recognized as an AllAmerican.”