APSU Sports Information
Brentwood, TN – After starting the Ohio Valley Conference schedule 4-0 for the first time since 2010-11, Austin Peay State University men’s basketball team continued to reap rewards with Terry Taylor taking adidas® OVC Men’s Basketball Freshman of the Week honors and senior Averyl Ugba picking up a share of the Newcomer of the Week honor.
For Taylor, it represents his league-best fourth Freshman of the Week tally. The Bowling Green, Kentucky native started the week with 15 points and five boards in front of a national audience in the Governors’ CBS Sports Network contest against UT Martin, Thursday, but saved his best for last in Saturday’s matchup against Southeast Missouri.
In the second half against the Redhawks, Taylor scored 24 of his game-high 29 points, securing 14 rebounds—both a career-high and most by a Gov in 2017-18—in the contest. In the final seconds, he calmly sank four free throws to secure the Govs’ win.
Ugba, meanwhile, secured his third straight double-double with a 13-point, 10-rebound performance against UT Martin, becoming the first Gov since Kenny Jones (November 18th-20th, 2016) with three-straight double-double outings. He narrowly missed a fourth straight double-double performance, finishing with 13 points and eight boards against Southeast Missouri, Saturday. He shared this week’s Newcomer honor with Tennessee Tech’s Shaq Buchannan, who he and the Govs will face, Thursday night, in Cookeville.
Ugba now has been named Newcomer of the week four times overall and three weeks in a row as Austin Peay has been represented among the three weekly conference honors in seven of the last nine weeks. This is the third time the Govs have taken a share of two of the three honors—Ugba and Dayton Gumm were Newcomer and Freshman of the Week, respectively, for the week of November 27th, while Ugba shared Player of the Week honors in addition to his Newcomer award last week.
The Govs look to continue their torrid start to OVC play this week, kicking off a four-game road trip with a Thursday, January 11th, 2018 visit to Tennessee Tech.
