SALT LAKE CITY — Utah’s Jakob Poeltl is standing tall once again.
On Friday, the consensus second-team All-American received the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award as the nation’s top center. Abdul-Jabbar presented the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame accolade to Poeltl at ESPN’s College Basketball Awards show in Los Angeles.
The four other finalists for the honor included Weber State’s Joel Bolomboy, as well as Ben Bentil (Providence), A.J. Hammons (Purdue) and Domantas Sabonis (Gonzaga).
Poeltl is the second winner of the Abdul-Jabbar Award, which was created in 2015. Wisconsin’s Frank Kaminsky was the first honoree.
“It’s absolutely amazing,” Poeltl told ESPN’s Jay Bilas. “I think Kareem is the best center to ever play the game and to be honored in his name is just a surreal feeling.”
Poeltl acknowledged it was special as well.
“It just means a lot to me and I think it’s a testament to all the hard work that I’ve put in and all the support I’ve got from my family and from my coaches throughout my career,” he said.
Poeltl, who guided Utah to 27 wins and a second straight NCAA tournament appearance this past season, led the Utes with 17.2 points and 9.1 rebounds per game. He also had a team-high 56 blocked shots and made 64.6 percent of his shots from the field. Besides All-American recognition, Poeltl was named Pac-12 Player of the Year and was a finalist for several national player of the year honors. Last week, he received the NABC's Pete Newell Big Man of the Year Award.
Poeltl, who is expected to announce his intentions regarding an early entry into the NBA at a press conference next week, is the second Utah player to receive a “Hoop Hall” honor. A year ago, Poeltl’s former teammate Delon Wright won the Bob Cousy Award as the nation’s top point guard.
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