SLC Preseason All-SLC Teams Named
10/24/2000 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Oct. 24, 2000
DALLAS ? McNeese State University has a prodigious presence on the 2000-01 Preseason All-Southland Conference men's basketball teams. The league's leading scorers in two of the last three years and last season's second-best rebounder headline the teams, hoping to help the Cowboys improve on their ninth-place finish of a year ago.
Tierre Brown heads the trio of Cowboys after leading the Southland with a 22.0 scoring average last season as a junior. The 6-2 guard from Iowa, La., finished third in the Conference with 4.5 assists and was 13th in steals with 1.7 per contest. Brown was voted to the first team while his two teammates are second-team selections.
Brown will be joined in the McNeese backcourt by Demond Mallet, the leading scorer in the Southland in 1998, who returns for his senior season after missing much of last year with an injury. Mallet, a 6-1 guard, has been voted to the second team after averaging 18.9 points a game during the 1997-98 season. The Southland's third-leading scorer as a junior with 17.6 points per game, Mallet was injured in the second game last season and missed the remainder of McNeese's 6-21 season.
The third McNeese player named to the preseason squads is forward Fred Gentry, a senior from DeQuincy, La., who is also a second-teamer. At 6-7, Gentry finished second in the Southland with 8.5 rebounds a game last season.
Devin Brown, a former Southland Freshman of the Year (1999), is expected to be the University of Texas at San Antonio's top player once again. He finds himself on the preseason first-team after averaging 18.5 points and 3.5 assists last season. Brown and his Roadrunners are preseason favorites to win the Southland title after finishing third with a 15-13 overall mark and going 12-6 in Southland play in 1999-2000.
The two Browns are the only two first-team selections from last year returning.
A third guard, Jeremy Burkhalter of Sam Houston State, is listed on the first team after being voted second-team last March. Another former Freshman of the Year (1998), Burkhalter finished sixth in scoring with 15.9 points per game and was one of the top 3-point shooters in the Southland last year in helping SHSU to a regular-season championship.
The Southland's single-season leader in blocked shots, Wojciech Myrda of Louisiana-Monroe, is the first-team center. Standing 7-0, Myrda broke his own Southland record with 144 swats (5.14 per game) last season and now has 240 for his career. Heading into his junior season, Myrda, who averaged 9.0 points and 6.6 rebounds last year, needs 28 blocks to break the Southland's career record.
Rounding out the first-team selections is Arthur Haralson of Nicholls State. A senior from Gary, Ind., Haralson finished eighth in the Southland with 15.6 points a contest and eighth in steals with a 2.05 average.
Joining Mallet and Gentry on the second team are Senecca Wall of SHSU, Ron Banks of Stephen F. Austin State University and Kenyon Spears of Lamar University.
2000-01 Preseason All-Southland Conference Men's Basketball Teams
FIRST TEAM Tierre Brown McNeese State Sr. G 6-2 Iowa, La. Devin Brown Texas-San Antonio Jr. G 6-4 San Antonio, Texas Jeremy Burkhalter Sam Houston State Sr. G 6-4 Humble, Texas Wojciech Myrda Louisiana-Monroe Jr. C 7-0 Rzeszow, Poland Arthur Haralson Nicholls State Sr. F 6-5 Gary, Ind.SECOND TEAM Demond Mallet McNeese State Sr. G 6-1 Leesville, La. Senecca Wall Sam Houston State Sr. F 6-4 Ft. Worth, Texas Ron Banks Stephen F. Austin Sr. F 6-8 Hogansville, Ga. Fred Gentry McNeese State Sr. C/F 6-7 DeQuincy, La. Kenyon Spears Lamar Sr. G 6-3 Nome, Texas
