Junior guard Tanisha Wright was named Big Ten Defensive Player of the Year, while Penn State women's basketball coach Rene Portland and senior guard Kelly Mazzante were picked as Big Ten Coach and Player of the Year, respectively, by both the conference coaches and media.
Wright said yesterday at the team's weekly press conference that the team deserved all of the awards they received.
Wright herself is especially deserving.
As a junior, Wright seems to be establishing a firm grip on the title of the league's best defender. Every game, the Mifflinville native draws the toughest defensive assignment, and she has shut down marquee scorers on more than one occasion this season. For details, ask Minnesota's Lindsay Whalen and Louisiana State's Seimone Augustus. Wright held the All-Americans to 15 and 12 points, respectively.
The first person to be named Defensive Player of the Year more than once in the award's five-year history, Wright will be favored to snag the award for a third time next year as a senior.
"Rightfully so," Portland said. "I don't think her award was ever in question."
The other two accolades given -- Player of the Year and Coach of the Year -- did go down to the wire, however. The way these two awards shook out is another indication of just how important Penn State's 69-60 win against No. 6 Purdue (24-3, 14-2) was in shaping the Big Ten landscape.
The laurels for Coach and Player of the Year could have easily gone to Purdue women's basketball coach Kristy Curry and Purdue senior forward Shereka Wright. But in the deciding game for the regular season league title, Portland made the necessary adjustments to beat Curry's Boilermakers, and Mazzante out-scored Wright, netting 24 points to Wright's 21. Portland said then that she hoped the performance would earn Mazzante the Player of the Year honors. Her hopes were answered.
"It is amazing that this time last week we were sitting here, and you guys were asking me about her slump and how she is going to get out of her slump," Portland said. "[Then], she gets Player of the Week and Player of the Year ... Kelly showed a lot of strength."
The slump Portland speaks of is probably why the recipient of the award was uncertain until the very end of the regular season. Mazzante sat atop the conference leaders in scoring until three games of cold shooting sent her average plummeting. During that three-game slouch against Michigan, Wisconsin and Iowa, the Montoursville native scored 16, 15 and four points, dropping Mazzante's scoring average by more than a point per game, from 21.7 to 20.5.
Mazzante benefited from not having to compete for the award with 2001-02 recipient Minnesota guard Lindsay Whalen, who missed the latter half of the regular season with a broken hand.
But in the end, it all came down to the Purdue game. In that game, the two-time All-American went head-to-head with her chief competitor for the accolade, Shereka Wright, and led her team to a victory. Just as it was for the league championship race, the Player of the Year award was a tighter chase this year. Penn State only had to win 13 games last year to win the title, as opposed to 15 this season, and Mazzante ran away with the award that year.
"It's exciting the fact that we did it last year and we turned around and did it again," Mazzante said. "It was a lot more difficult [this season]."
Other honorees are Penn State junior point guard Jess Strom, who was named third team All-Big Ten by the coaches and the media, and senior forward Jess Brungo was given an honorable mention by the coaches and the media. Penn State freshman center Reicina Russell was named to the coaches' All-Freshman Team.
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