COLUMBUS – It was almost a clean sweep by the Buckeyes when the Big Ten Conference announced its top post-season men’s and women’s basketball honors Monday.
Chris Holtmann was named men’s Big Ten Coach of the Year and Keita Bates-Diop was voted men’s Player of the Year by the coaches and media while Kelsey Mitchell took the women’s Player of the Year honors.
In his first season in Columbus, Holtmann led the 24-7 Buckeyes to the most wins under a first-year Ohio State coach and to a second-place finish in the Big Ten regular season.
Bates-Diop, a redshirt junior, was also a unanimous first team All-Big Ten pick after finishing second in the conference in scoring during the regular season at 19.2 points per game.
Mitchell was been named the Big Ten Player of the Year for the third time in her career and was also named first team All-Big Ten for the fourth-straight year. The honors came a day after she took over third place on the NCAA all-time women’s scoring list. She is joined on the first team by Stephanie Mavunga.
Mitchell shares the Player of the Year award this season with Iowa’s Megan Gustafson who was voted by the media while Mitchell earned the distinction from the coaches. Mitchell is just the second Buckeye to be named first team All-Big Ten four times, joining Jantel Lavender. She also joins Lavender and Jessica Davenport as the only three Buckeyes to be named Big Ten Player of the Year three times.
Joining Bates-Diop on All-Big Ten teams are Jae’Sean Tate, Kaleb Wesson and Andrew Dakich.
Michigan State’s Miles Bridges, Tony Carr of Penn State, Carsen Edwards of Purdue and Wisconsin’s Ethan Happ were also named to the first team.
Linnae Harper earned women’s second team All-Big Ten honors and Sierra Calhoun and Asia Doss also took home honorable mention honors.