For the second year in a row, Purdue's Zach Edey is the unanimous headliner of the Associated Press men's college basketball All-America team.
The 7-foot-4, 300-pound senior topped all 62 ballots of the top 25 voters in the AP poll in results released Tuesday. The reigning AP National Player of the Year earned all 58 votes last year.
Tennessee's Dalton Knecht and North Carolina's RJ Davis joined Edey (310 points) in a clear top trio. Knecht (298) was a first-team selection on 56 ballots, Davis (296) on 55 and both appeared among the top 10 players on each ballot.
Jamal Shead of Houston and Tristen Newton of reigning NCAA champion UConn rounded out the first team.
Edey leads the country in scoring with 24.4 points and ranks third in rebounds (11.7). Named the AP Big Ten Player of the Year for the second straight time, Edey has a chance to be the first player to repeat as AP National Player of the Year since another 7-4 star: Virginia's Ralph Sampson in 1981, 1982 and 1983.
Edey became Purdue's career scoring leader during a loss to Wisconsin in the Big Ten tournament.
“The thing here is, at the end of the day, he's not going to take credit,” teammate Braden Smith said. “He always points to us and says that he got here because of us and that we were helping him. An impressive achievement for him.”
Knecht, a 6-6 transfer from Northern Colorado, is the AP's SEC player of the year. He is just the fourth Volunteer to earn first-team honors, joining Grant Williams (2019), Dale Ellis (1983) and Bernard King (1977) after averaging 21.1 points to help the Volunteers win their first-ever crown. SEC regular season since 2008.
“His journey is one that you read about, like fairy-tale deals,” Vols associate head coach Justin Gainey said. “Just to see him get to this point and accomplish what he's accomplished is amazing. But it's all because of his hard work, his work ethic, his mentality, his confidence and his belief in himself.”
Davis, a 6-0 guard, was named the ACC's AP Player of the Year after averaging a league-best 21.4 points. He is UNC's first first-team AP All-American since 2017.
“RJ has been our closer, and in [close games] It's a great luxury to know that you can put the ball in our guard's hands and he'll make the right shot or the right play,” big man Armando Bacot said of Davis during the ACC tournament.
Shead, a 6-1 senior, has been the floor leader for a Houston team that won the Big 12 regular-season crown in its first year in the tough league. The honor for Shead, the AP Player of the Year in the Big 12, comes after the Cougars had a first-team selection last year in guard Marcus Sasser.
Newton, a 6-5 graduate, has elevated his game to give UConn the look of a team that could become college basketball's first repeat champion since Florida in 2006 and 2007. With the departures of the Finals Most Outstanding Player Four Adama Sanogo and Jordan Hawkins, Newton increased his scoring from 10.1 points last season to 15.2 points en route to becoming the AP Player of the Year in the Big East for the league champion.
Newton is UConn's first first-team AP All-American since Shabazz Napier in 2014.
Second team
Marquette's Tyler Kolek topped the second team and was the only other player to earn at least 10 first-team votes. The guard was an AP Third-Team All-American last season.
Alabama's Mark Sears joined Kolek in defending that second five, which features an imposing front line with Dayton's DaRon Holmes II (6-10), Duke's Kyle Filipowski (7-0) and Hunter Dickinson (7- 2) from Kansas. a second-team selection in 2021 when he was at Michigan.
Third team
San Diego State's Jaedon LeDee led the third-team selections, along with Auburn's Johni Broome, Pac-12 Player of the Year Caleb Love of Arizona and Creighton's Baylor Scheierman.
The last place went to Terrence Shannon Jr. of Illinois (54 points), the third scorer in the country with 23 points per game.
Honorable Mention
Kentucky's Antonio Reeves and Kansas' Kevin McCullar Jr. finished just behind Shannon and ranked as the top vote-getters among players who didn't make the All-America teams.
Players earned honorable mention status if they appeared on multiple voters' ballots. Although 21 players qualified, Providence's Reeves (52), McCullar (52) and Devin Carter (36) were the only players to earn more than 15 points in that group's voting.
The honorable mention list also included Bacot, a preseason All-American selection who was a third-team All-American last year.
