Arizona freshman Aaron Gordon just keeps on winning. First he earned MVP honors at the 2013 FIBA U19 World Championship after leading Team USA to a gold medal last summer. Currently in Tucson, Gordon has helped lead the Wildcats to a perfect 17-0 start to the season and the top ranked spot in the national rankings. And now today he was named the USA Basketball 2013 Male Athlete of the Year. Below is the official announcement from our friends at USA Basketball:
Arizona freshman Aaron Gordon (San Jose, Calif.), who helped the USA to a gold medal at the 2013 FIBA U19 World Championship and suited up for USA Basketball in the 2013 Nike Hoop Summit, today was announced as the 2013 USA Basketball Male Athlete of the Year.
“It’s a great honor,” Gordon said. “USA Basketball is a really good program. I respect everybody associated with USA Basketball, so for them to recognize me as Male Athlete of the Year is an incredible feeling.”
Coming off the bench in all nine games at the FIBA U19 World Championship, Gordon averaged team-highs of 12.6 points and 6.2 rebounds per game to go along with 2.0 steals in 18.8 minutes per game, and he was named MVP of the 16-team tournament.
“Aaron is a great player, and the thing I really give him and the rest of the players credit for is that every single one of those guys is a high-profile player and they all knew going in that there was going to be some form of sacrifice that was going to have to take place for us to win,” saidBilly Donovan, USA and University of Florida head coach. “No one was going to score 25 points, no one was going to play 35 minutes, it had to be a collective group effort and their buy-in ability toward that was tremendous.”
