Caitlin Clark and Monika Czinano added to Midseason Wooden Award Watch List
Wednesday evening the Los Angeles Athletic Club announced their Midseason Top 25 for the prestigious Wooden Award. For the Hawkeyes, it was both Caitlin Clark and Monika Czinano appearing on the list. Iowa joined Connecticut, South Carolina and Stanford as teams that put two players on the watch list. The Big Ten led all conferences with six selections.
Caitlin Clark
Caitlin Clark is averaging 27.1 points, 7.4 rebounds and 6.9 assists per game through the first 15 games of the season. Clark has four double-doubles on the season, as well as a triple-double against Wisconsin on December 4th. It was the seventh triple-double of her career which set a new Big Ten career record passing former Hawkeye Samantha Logic.
She recently eclipsed 2,000 points for her career against Dartmouth and reached the milestone in just 75 career games. That tied the NCAA record held by former Delaware star Elena Delle Donne as the fastest to 2,000 career points.
Caitlin is no stranger to awards. As a freshman during the 2020-21 season, she won Big Ten Freshman of the Year and the Dawn Staley Guard of the Year Award. She was a unanimous First Team All-Big Ten selection and a Second Team AP All-American selection.
Last season as a sophomore, Clark won Big Ten Player of the Year, Nancy Lieberman PG of the Year and Dawn Staley Guard of the Year. She was a unanimous First Team All-Big Ten selection and a First Team AP All-American selection. Clark was also a finalist for the Naismith Award, WBCA Wade Trophy and Wooden Award.
This season Caitlin earned preseason Big Ten Player of the Year and was named to preseason watch list for the Wooden Award and Nancy Lieberman PG of the Year. She was picked as a preseason unanimous First Team All-Big Ten and AP All-American.
Monika Czinano
Monika Czinano is averaging 17.8 points, 6.8 rebounds and has a 61.8% shooting percentage from the floor. She has a pair of double-doubles on the year to give her ten for her career. Czinano has led all of women’s college basketball in shooting percentage the past two seasons and currently is ranked 14th in the country this season.
Monika recently eclipsed 2,000 points for her career against Purdue. Clark and Czinano became the first pair of teammates in Big Ten women’s basketball history to accomplish the feat in the same season.
Czinano has been a First Team All-Big Ten selection each of the last three seasons and was a preseason selection this year. She finally started to garner national respect last season, as she was an Honorable Mention AP All-American selection and was a Semifinalist for the Lisa Lesile Center of the Year Award. The Wooden Award recognized her on their preseason watch list.
