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Alana Beard Selected One of 16 Finalists For John R. Wooden Award
March 8, 2004
LOS ANGELES, CALIF. - The John R. Wooden Award Committee on Monday announced the 16 women's college basketball players named to the official voting ballot for the 2004 Women's Wooden Award presented by Applied Materials. The Player of the Year and All-American team will be announced on Thursday, April 8, prior to Saturday's telecast of the "John R. Wooden Award Show Presented by Allstate" live from The Los Angeles Athletic Club on CBS beginning at 1 pm EST.
"We are thrilled to announce that one of these 16 players will go down in history as the first woman to receive the Wooden Award," said Mike Solum, director of the Wooden Award. "At this point, a case could be made for several of these women to be crowned Player of the Year, so it will come down to the end of the season when the elite players separate themselves as frontrunners."
Duke University senior Alana Beard is among the 16 finalists selected after guiding Duke to a 26-3 overall and 15-1 mark in the Atlantic Coast Conference. Beard, a native of Shreveport, La., continues to have an outstanding season averaging 20.4 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.8 assists, 2.4 steals and 1.3 blocks, while hitting 51.8 percent of her field goals and 35.8 percent from three-point range.
On Sunday, Beard was named ACC Player of the Year for the third straight year and will play in the ACC Championship game on Monday at 7:30 p.m. against North Carolina in search of Duke's fifth straight ACC Championship. If the Blue Devils win on Monday, Beard will be among a senior class which won four straight ACC Regular Season titles and four straight ACC Championships. This is something no other men's or women's player in ACC history has ever accomplished.
A panel of over 200 voters comprised of sports media members and women's college basketball experts from around the nation will have until noon pacific time on Monday, March 29 to cast their votes for both the five-member All-American team and Wooden Award recipient as the most outstanding female collegiate basketball player in the United States. The Wooden Award opts for the March 29 deadline because it allows voters to evaluate players up until the Elite Eight has been determined.
Now in its 28th year, the John R. Wooden Award is named for the former University of California at Los Angeles coach who won ten national championships during a legendary career, while also garnering a reputation for high moral standards. Among national basketball honors, the Wooden Award is unique in that it considers both character and academic standards when naming its recipient. Each athlete must be making progress toward graduation and must be accredited by his school as maintaining a cumulative 2.0 grade point average. All 16 finalists have met the criteria to be considered on the official ballot.
The 2004 Award ceremony, which will include the presentation of the Wooden Award All-American Team, the inaugural Women's Wooden Award and the presentation of the Legends of Coaching Award to Stanford Coach Mike Montgomery, will be held at The Los Angeles Athletic Club on Saturday, April 10. The All-American Team will be announced on March 31 and the top five women's candidates will be invited to Los Angeles for the Awards ceremony. Each finalist will receive a contribution from the John R. Wooden Award Scholarship Fund in her name to their university's general scholarship fund.
The John R. Wooden Award Scholarship Fund was established by Wooden Award sponsor Applied Materials through the California Community Foundation to honor Coach Wooden's dedication as a teacher and educator. Applied Materials distributed $15,000 last year to each university represented by a Wooden Award All-American Team finalist (Kansas, Marquette, Oklahoma, Texas and Xavier) for a total of $75,000. Additional donations to Applied Materials' John R. Wooden Award Scholarship Fund can be made by contacting the scholarship fund through the CCF (www.calfund.org).
Created in 1976, the John R. Wooden Award is the most prestigious individual honor in college basketball. It is bestowed upon the nation's best player at an institution of higher education who has proven to his university that he is making progress toward graduation and maintaining a cumulative 2.00 GPA. Previous winners include such notables as Michael Jordan ('84), Larry Bird ('79), Tim Duncan ('97) and last year's recipient, T.J. Ford ('03). Tabulation for all voting is calculated by Deloitte & Touche.
Wooden Women's Award Ballot
All-American Team - Top 16 Candidates
(Players listed alphabetically)
A national poll was conducted by the John R. Wooden Women's Award National Advisory Board to determine the ballot for the 2003-2004 Wooden Award All-American Team. The top 16 candidates have been selected based on this year's individual performance and team records.
Seimone Augustus 6'1" So. G LSU Alana Beard 5'11" Sr. G/F Duke Tera Bjorklund 6'5" Sr. C Colorado Vanessa Hayden 6'4" Sr. C Florida Chandi Jones 5'10" Sr. F/G Houston Kelly Mazzante 6'0" Sr. G Penn State Nicole Ohlde 6'5" Sr. F/C Kansas State Cappie Pondexter 5'9" Jr. G Rutgers Nicole Powell 6'2" Sr. F Stanford Heather Schreiber 6'2" Jr. F Texas Khara Smith 6'2" So. F DePaul Stacy Stephens 6'1" Sr. F Texas Diana Taurasi 6'0" Sr. G Connecticut Kendra Wecker 5'11" Jr. F Kansas State Lindsay Whalen 5'9" Sr. G Minnesota Shereka Wright 5'10" Sr. F Purdue
- John R. Wooden Award/Duke-
