FAIRMONT, W.Va. – After leading the No. 1-ranked West Liberty University men’s basketball team to a fourth consecutive West Virginia Conference championship and the No. 1 seed in this weekend’s regional Tournament, Hilltopper senior Alex Falk has been honored as the 2013 Daktronics Atlantic Region Player of the Year.
Junior teammate Cedric Harris was a second-team All-Region pick for the Black and Gold. West Liberty was the only team with multiple All-Region selections. Half of this year’s 12 selections will be in action Saturday when the Atlantic Regional tournament tips off at the ASRC.
A 6-4 guard from Upper Sandusky, Ohio who has played in a school-record 131 career games, leading the Hilltoppers to a 123-8 record in those contests, Falk adds the Atlantic Region Player of the Year trophy to his 2013 WVIAC Player of the Year hardware. The leading scorer (20.8 ppg.) on the nation’s highest-scoring team and a 4-time WVIAC Player of the Week, Falk led the Hilltoppers to three double-digit wins in the WVIAC Tournament. He was the leading scorer in the event and earned his second straight Tournament MVP Award. An 81 percent foul shooter, the hard-charging senior led the WVIAC in free throws made (173), accounting for 33 percent of WLU’s conference-best 520 points from the charity stripe. His 95 steals not only led the WVIAC, they rank No. 2 all-time at West Liberty.
Falk reached double-figures in all but one of the Hilltoppers’ 31 games. He had 16 20-point games and three 30-point games, topped by a career-high 37 points in a 90-74 win at Findlay (Ohio). Honored at the WVIAC Tournament as West Liberty’s 2013 Senior Scholar-Athlete, Falk ranks No. 6 on the Hilltoppers’ career scoring list with 1,894 career points.
Joining Falk as First-Team All-Region selections are Whis Grant, a 6-0 sophomore guard from East Stroudsburg, Pa.; Trevin Parks, a 5-11 senior guard from Johnson C. Smith (N.C.), Angelo Sharpless, a 6-4 senior guard from Elizabeth City State (N.C.) and Byron Westmorland, a 6-4 guard from Bowie State (Md.).
Harris missed several games due to a late-season injury but did more than enough to add All-Region honors to his second straight first-team All-WVIAC citation. A 6-0 junior guard from Zanesville, Ohio, Harris reached double figures on 20 occasions with 10 20-point games and a trio of 30-point nights. He picked up the slack for an injured Falk in that Pitt-Johnstown game with a career-high 32 points.
The playmaking guard also had career-highs of 11 assists in wins against Point Park (Pa.) and West Virginia State. He finished second in the WVIAC in steals at 2.54 per game and third in assist/turnover ratio. Harris also ranked among the WVIAC leaders in scoring (17.6 ppg.), field goal percentage (.523), 3-point field goal percentage (.455) and free throw percentage (.806). One of four 1,000-point scorers on the WLU roster, he has 1,547 points in three collegiate seasons.
Joining Harris on the second-team unit are six seniors: 6-5 Luis Leao of Mercyhurst, 6-5 Chad Moore of Shepherd, 6-0 Nick Novak of Pitt-Johnstown, 6-6 Devin Taylor of Slippery Rock, 6-3 Isaac Thornton of Fairmont State and West Virginia Wesleyan’s 6-7 Kelsey Williams.
The All-Region and All-America women’s basketball teams are sponsored by Daktronics and voted on by the members of the NCAA Division II Sports Information Directors Association. Falk and the other first-team All-Region selections advance to the ballot for the 2013 All-America Team.
West Liberty opens defense of its Atlantic Region title Saturday at 6 p.m. when the Hilltoppers host Bowie State in a quarterfinal tilt at the ASRC.
Daktronics Men’s Basketball
2012-13 All-Atlantic Region
First Team
Player Ht Yr School PPG RPG APG
ALEX FALK* 6-4 SR. WEST LIBERTY 20.8 4.2 3.4
Whis Grant 6-0 So. East Stroudsburg 17.3 3.2 2.9
Trevin Parks 5-11 Sr. Johnson C. Smith 25.0 3.5 4.1
Angelo Sharpless 6-4 Sr. Elizabeth City State 20.5 8.8 2.6
Byron Westmorland 6-4 Sr. Bowie State 23.5 6.1 1.9
*-Player of the Year
Second Team
Player Ht Yr School PPG RPG APG
CEDRIC HARRIS 6-0 JR. WEST LIBERTY 17.6 3.4 5.2
Luis Leao 6-5 Sr. Mercyhurst 18.6 6.7 1.7
Chad Moore 6-5 Sr. Shepherd 22.9 9.0 2.8
Nick Novak 6-0 Sr. Pitt-Johnstown 21.9 3.2 5.8
Devin Taylor 6-6 Sr. Slippery Rock 14.2 10.0 1.0
Isaac Thornton 6-3 Sr. Fairmont State 17.7 5.3 2.8
Kelsey Williams 6-7 Sr. W.Va. Wesleyan 21.5 10.9 0.7
