Coaches from around the American Conference voted on their preseason picks for the upcoming basketball season, which was announced Thursday.
Wichita State women’s basketball was selected to finish 12th out of 13 teams for the second-straight season, while men’s basketball was voted to finish in fifth.
The Shockers’ women’s basketball team ended last season in 12th place, as predicted, in the conference standings and faced a massive roster overhaul this offseason.
WSU’s men’s team finished last season in eighth place after being predicted to finish in fourth.
Men’s basketball head coach Paul Mills said Thursday that he doesn’t put a whole lot of emphasis on preseason rankings, especially since the conference loses a lot of its top players each year in the transfer portal or through graduation.
“There’s a whole bunch of guessing going on,” Mills said. “I mean, of the top 20 players a year ago who made First or Second Team All-Conference, one of them returns.”
South Florida’s women’s basketball team garnered the most first-place votes, and Memphis was voted to finish first on the men’s side.
Senior guard Kenyon Giles was the only men’s or women’s player to make the Preseason All-Conference Team. The UNC Greensboro transfer is the fourth WSU player to make it since joining the league in 2017, and first since Tyson Etienne in 2021.
