The No. 17 BYU women’s basketball team captured two major West Coast Conference awards Wednesday afternoon.
Shaylee Gonzales earned WCC Player of the Year honors and Jeff Judkins was named Coach of the Year for the second consecutive season.
Paisley Harding and Lauren Gustin were included on the All-WCC First Team along with Gonzales. Tegan Graham was an honorable mention selection.
Gonzales is averaging 18.7 points, 5.7 rebounds and 4.4 assists per game. She poured in a career-high 35 points against Saint Mary’s.
“Shaylee deserves this award. She has been the best player in the league all season from start to finish and been so consistent,” Judkins said. “I am happy for the players who received these honors and recognize everyone on our team has contributed to our success this year in a lot of different ways.”
This marks the seventh time a BYU player has been named WCC Player of the Year. Gonzales shared the honor last season. The last time a BYU player won it outright was Cassie Broadhead in 2017.
In 2018-19, Gonzales won the WCC Newcomer of the Year award and was an All-WCC First-Team honoree.
Judkins is the all-time winningest basketball coach at BYU with 455 victories. This is his sixth conference coach of the year accolade.
Judkins also won consecutive Mountain West Coach of the Year awards in 2006 and 2007. He won MWC Coach of the Year in 2011 and his first WCC honor in 2016 and then again in 2021.
“A coach of the year award is an award for your whole program,” Judkins said. “I am really proud of the championship we’ve won, and to accomplish that your players and coaching staff have to come through. These awards are for everyone involved in BYU basketball.”
BYU (25-2) captured the outright WCC championship and will play Monday afternoon in the WCC Tournament semifinals.
In other WCC awards, Ali Bamberger from Saint Mary’s won Newcomer of the Year, Gonzaga’s Yvonne Ejim was Sixth Woman of the Year and San Diego’s Jordyn Edwards won Defensive Player of the Year.
All five major individual awards — as well as with the All-West Coast Conference teams and the All-Freshman Team — were voted on solely by the league’s 10 head coaches.
Harding received All-WCC honors for the fourth time in her career, including three consecutive first-team awards. She’s averaged 17.2 points per game this year, ranking fifth in the WCC. Harding has scored in double figures in 24 of 27 games, highlighted by a career-high 33 in a win over Utah. She averaged 3.1 rebounds, 2.6 assists and 1.7 steals.
Gustin has posted 14 double-doubles in the regular season, leading the league and ranking No. 19 nationally. It marks her second consecutive All-WCC First-Team award.
Ranked No. 8 nationally in rebounding, Gustin pulled down a WCC-best 11.7 boards per game while averaging 11.2 points. Gustin had 10 or more rebounds in 21 of 26 games played.
Graham leads BYU with 66 made 3-pointers this year and was fourth in the WCC in 3-point percentage at 40.0% from downtown. She averaged 10.1 points per game.
Graham also averaged 4.8 assists per game, ranking second in the conference. Last year, she was also an All-WCC honorable mention.