Tide Basketball Team Holds Annual Awards Reception
4/16/2003 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
TUSCALOOSA - The University of Alabama men's basketball team held its annual awards reception on Tuesday night at the Bryant Conference Center on the University of Alabama's campus.
Crimson Tide sophomore guard Mo Williams won the most team honors, taking home three awards as the player with the "Highest Free Throw Percentage," "Highest Assists Average" and "Most Steals."
Erwin Dudley, the first player to win three straight Southeastern Conference rebounding titles since Shaquille O'Neal did so at LSU a decade ago, won two awards. The senior forward from Uniontown, who played in the National Association of Basketball Coaches All- Star game in New Orleans two weekends ago, won for "Highest Field Goal Percentage" and for his forte' the "Jerry Harper Rebound Leader Award."
Other winners included co-winners Lucky Williams and Demetrius Smith who shared the "Guy Lee Turner Memorial Defensive Award" as defensive leaders on the team; Terrance Meade who won the "Hayden Riley Scholastic Award"; freshman Evan Brock who took home the "Hustle Award"; Antoine Pettway who won the "Highest 3-point Field Goal Percentage Award"; and Kenny Walker who won the "Most Blocked Shots Awards."
Tide head coach Mark Gottfried lauded his senior class for all that trio had done to lead the program during their four seasons at Alabama including winning the 2002 SEC regular season championship, achieving the school's first ever No. 1 basketball ranking, setting the school record for most consecutive home wins at 28 this season, and winning 82 games since their freshman season including home seasons where they were 17-1 in 2001 and 17-0 in 2002 and 13-2 in 2003.
"The last 50 times you walked back to your car from one of their games in Coleman Coliseum, 47 of those times you went home from a win," Gottfried told the audience that included hundreds of Tide basketball supporters.
The reception also applauded Alabama's basketball players' work in the classroom as four players, all of them starters at some point this season, were named to the Academic All-SEC honor roll which requires a 3.0 and higher GPA. Those players included 2002 SEC Player of the Year Erwin Dudley (criminal justice major), three-time winner Terrance Meade (management), Kenny Walker (communications) and Earnest Shelton (accounting). Meade was also the first Tide basketball player to be named a Verizon Academic All-America All-District Award winner.
The event, co-sponsored by the Tuscaloosa Tip-Off Club and TIDE PRIDE, included the annual passing of the gavel for 2002-03 Tip-Off Club President Jimmy Warren to the 2003-04 club president Chuck Hardin.
