Southern Oregon’s Josh Meyer and Atmar Mundu earned spots on the All-Cascade Conference men’s basketball team and Will Graves received honorable mention, the CCC office announced Tuesday.
The senior trio helped the Raiders to third place in the standings and a trip to the CCC Tournament semifinals, and they’re on the bubble ahead of Thursday’s 64-team NAIA National Tournament bracket reveal. Meyer became SOU’s third three-time honoree in the last decade, joining Ben DeSaulnier and Eric Thompson, and Mundu claimed a spot on the 15-person squad after garnering honorable mention a year ago. Graves, in his first season with the Raiders, was among 10 individuals who received honorable mention.
Eastern Oregon’s Phillip Malatare was voted player of the year. League regular-season and tournament champion College of Idaho produced the coach of the year in Colby Blaine and the defensive player of the year in Charles Elzie. Bushnell’s Spencer Hoffman was named the newcomer of the year and Lewis-Clark State’s John Lustig the freshman of the year.
In conference play, Meyer averaged 9.5 points on 48.5-percent shooting and was the only CCC player to rank among the top-10 in both assists (4.1, 4th) and rebounds (7.1, 6th). He’s posted five double-doubles and became the first Raider in eight years to record a triple-double with 14 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists on Jan. 28 against Multnomah.
Mundu was among the circuit’s most prolific and efficient scorers in CCC play. He averaged 16.2 points over 21 games, putting him at No. 6 on the leaderboard, and was also 12th in shooting percentage (51.8), fifth in 3-point percentage (44.1) and second in 3-point makes per game (2.9). He’s averaging 16.5 points overall, the fourth-best mark in the CCC, and has scored in double figures all 29 outings.
Graves injected more shooting into the SOU lineup and wound up 21st on the CCC scoring leaderboard at 12.8 per game in conference action. He also led the CCC in free-throw percentage (91.2), ranked sixth in steals (1.5) and 15th in 3-pointers per game (1.8) on a 36-percent clip.
Content used with permission, compliments of SOU Sports
Photo by Al Case, Ashland Daily Photo.
