BYU hoops: Rice in the running for honor
Dave Rose is doing his final wrap-up media interviews with beat writers who cover his team today. We’ll see stories start filtering out from this coverage in the next few days. Our Jim Rayburn is assigned to do meet with Rose today.
In the meantime, his chief assistant is receiving some attention and is in the running for an honor. Here is a copy of the press release on the campaign:
BYU men’s basketball associate head coach Dave Rice has been named one of 20 semifinalists for BasketballScoop.com’s “Coaches of the Year” award, which highlights “Rising Stars” in the college basketball coaching profession.
Rice joined the BYU coaching staff as an assistant in 2005 when Dave Rose was named the head coach. As the coordinator of the Cougar offense and the team’s recruiting efforts Rice has helped the Cougars achieve four-straight 20-win seasons and four-straight trips to the postseason, with an NIT bid in 2006 and NCAA invites in 2007, 2008 and 2009. BYU has also won three-straight Mountain West Conference regular season titles, with outright titles in 2007 and 2008 and a share of the crown in 2009.
This season Rice helped the Cougars finish as the best offensive team in the MWC, leading the league in scoring, scoring margin, field goal percentage and three-point field goal percentage. He has been instrumental in the development of 2009 all-MWC honorees Lee Cummard, Jimmer Fredette and Jonathan Tavernari.
Each semifinalist was nominated by at least one of his peers. Voting is now available on BasketballScoop.com through April 15.
BasketballScoop.com’s panel of coaches will evaluate the ten coaches with the most votes and select the five winners.