DENVER - University of Denver head men's basketball coach Jeff Wulbrun announced the recipients of two annual awards ahead of the program's late-summer break on Wednesday night.
The ISAID Award is given to the student-athlete that embodies and reflects the program's core values on a daily basis; Integrity, Selflessness, Accountability, Investment & Discipline. At Wednesday night's team meeting, this year's recipient was graduate student guard Isaiah Addo-Ankrah.
"Isaiah has set the standards for our program this offseason with his daily actions and leadership," Wulbrun said. "He strives for excellence in all he does and has been the model of consistency. He is an academic scholar, a leader and he has demonstrated great work habits and invests in all his teammates at a very high level. Isaiah truly embodies and reflects all our Core Values."
The Floyd M. Theard Memorial Award is given to the student-athlete who best displays the qualities of leadership, scholarship and sportsmanship that had been demonstrated by Coach Theard during his lifetime. Yesterday's recipient was sophomore guard DeAndre Craig.
"DeAndre has stepped forward this offseason with the objective of assuming more of a leadership role," Wulbrun said. "He competes with passion, physicality, toughness and competitiveness, all while keeping a great demeanor for his teammates. He always reflects great sportsmanship. DeAndre reflects all of the values Coach Theard held so dearly, and I'm honored to give DeAndre this year's award."
The 2024-25 Pioneers:
Denver's 2024-25 roster returns two regular starters and five players that started at least one game a year ago. Isaiah Addo-Ankrah played in all 34 games, starting 23, averaging 6.1 points and 2.3 rebounds per game. Addo-Ankrah finished second on the team with 56 made triples, and netted three, game-winning three-pointers in the final 10 seconds of games, including with five seconds to go in Denver's Summit League Semifinal upset of Kansas City.
Pedro Lopez-Sanvicente also started 23 games, averaging 6.4 points and 3.7 rebounds in 21.1 minutes per game. Lopez-Sanvicente backed-up the Addo-Ankrah semifinal triple with the game-winning block as time expired to send Denver to its first conference final since 2005. Isaiah Carr averaged 5.2 points, 4.4 rebounds in 16.8 minutes of action while adding a team-high 60 blocked shots.
Ben Bowen started six games and DeAndre Craig played in all 34 contests, averaging 6.6 points and distributing 85 assists.
The Pioneers welcome a strong newcomer class to the roster this season. Freshmen Sebastian Akins, Josh Pickett, Adbulai Fanta Kabba, Tymo Sternicki, Loch Cunningham and Jon Mani were all added to the roster in the offseason and are joined by transfer and Mid Major Madness Summit League Preseason Newcomer of the Year Nicholas Shogbonyo.
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