With the college basketball season fast approaching, several preseason award watch lists have been announced, and two of those include UCLA Basketball’s Thomas Welsh and Kris Wilkes.
The UCLA Basketball team is starting the 2017-18 season strong. After finishing last year 31-5 with a trip to the Sweet 16, the Bruins look to continue their success with a new crop of freshmen and some key veterans.
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Two of these Bruins are already being recognized as senior Thomas Welsh has been named to the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award watch list (given to the top center in college hoops) and freshman Kris Wilkes has been named to the Julius Irving Award watch list (given to the top small forward).
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Freshman Kris Wilkes (@kadw31) is among 20 top small forwards named to the initial watch list for the 2018 Julius Erving Award.
— UCLA Men’s Basketball (@UCLAMBB) October 18, 2017
NEWS: https://t.co/a9PmJApJip pic.twitter.com/xHkJuIKswh
Thomas Welsh (@tomwelsh40) has been named as one of 20 top centers to the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (@kaj33) Award's preseason watch list.
— UCLA Men’s Basketball (@UCLAMBB) October 20, 2017
NEWS: https://t.co/Td5I1At8r8 pic.twitter.com/ErrDbR44Vq
Welsh is going to be a corner stone of the team as the senior leader. He has made a lot of improvement on the offensive end in the last two years as he has added a solid mid-range baseline jumper, which is hard to defend against his 7’0″ frame. He looks to build off that with a three-point shot he has been developing in the off-season. Last year Welsh led the Bruins in rebounds with 8.7 per game. He was 6th on the team in scoring with 10.8 ppg.
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Wilkes is a 5-start recruit from Indiana (who also happened to be named Indiana’s Mr. Basketball) and brings a lot of excitement to Westwood. Last season at North Central High School, he averaged 22.6 ppg and 5.6 rebounds. He should be a key contributor out on the wing.
Last season, the UCLA Basketball team had each one of their starters named to a preseason award watch list. Lonzo Ball, Bryce Alford, Isaac Hamilton, TJ Leaf and Thomas Welsh all received recognition at the beginning of the 2016-17 season.
This year, though only two Bruins might have seen their name attached to preseason awards, this roster is loaded with talent. Two players we thought we might see on the preseason Bob Cousy Award watch list (top point guard) are junior Aaron Holiday and freshmen Jaylen Hands. Though they did not make this list in the preseason, watch for them to slow creep into it by season’s end.
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The UCLA Basketball team was ranked 18th in the preseason coaches poll. Other Pac-12 teams included #5 Arizona and #11 USC. These rankings do not take into consideration possible sanctions or potential ineligible players for both the Wildcats and Trojans.