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  • UCLA Senior Kobe Johnson Makes Latest Lefty Driesell Award Watch List Cut

UCLA Senior Kobe Johnson Makes Latest Lefty Driesell Award Watch List Cut

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Basketball

UCLA senior Kobe Johnson has been selected as one of 30 top players to the end-of-season watch list for the Lefty Driesell Award, presented annually by CollegeInsider.com to the nation's top defensive player.

Johnson, a 6-foot-6 guard from Milwaukee, Wis., earned Big Ten Conference All-Defensive Team recognition earlier this week. He has secured conference all-defensive acclaim in three consecutive seasons, including the 2022-23 and 2023-24 seasons while at USC in the Pac-12 Conference.

Johnson has averaged 7.9 points, a team-leading 6.0 rebounds and 3.0 assists per game, having started all 31 games for UCLA. Johnson leads the team in steals (53) and ranks No. 6 among all Big Ten players in steals per game (1.7), entering this week's Big Ten Tournament. He also ranks among the top 20 in the conference in rebounds per game (6.0 rpg).

The Lefty Driesell Award is named in honor of the legendary coach who had spent over four decades serving as a head coach. Driesell led his teams to 786 wins through 41 seasons at Davidson, Maryland, James Madison and Georgia State. He ranks eighth on the NCAA Division I list for head coaching wins, as his teams at each stop were known for playing tenacious defense.

The recipient of the annual Lefty Driesell Award is determined by a 10-member voting committee, consisting of current and former head coaches and two senior staff members of the national website CollegeInsider.com. This year's award will be announced in San Antonio, Texas, the site of this year's NCAA Men's Basketball Final Four.

Johnson is one of three players from the Big Ten Conference selected to the end-of-season watch list. Johnson joins Oregon's TJ Bamba and Penn State's Ace Baldwin Jr. on the list of 30 finalists.

UP NEXT: UCLA will play in the Big Ten Tournament against either No. 5-seed Wisconsin or No. 13-seed Northwestern on Friday, March 14. As one of the conference's top four seeds, the Bruins are awaiting to see who wins in the second-round contest on Thursday (between Wisconsin and Northwestern). UCLA will open in the quarterfinals at 11:30 a.m. PT (2:30 p.m. ET) on Friday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.