Washington Earns Sun Belt Conference Weekly Honors

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Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns junior forward Bryce Washington was named the Sun Belt Conference Men's Basketball Player of the Week on Tuesday after helping lead the Ragin' Cajuns to a pair of victories and extending their winning streak to eight games.

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[MelRock]

Good to see Bryce being rewarded for his performance on the court. One of the nicest young men to ever come through the program.

[VObserver]

Good to see Bryce being rewarded for his performance on the court. One of the nicest young men to ever come through the program.

I agree 100% with this. He is also an exceptionally good [though not flashy] basketball player.

[Cajunsmike]

I agree 100% with this. He is also an exceptionally good [though not flashy] basketball player.

Something like your power forward having ability to bring the ball upcourt against the press is an indication of what VO is trying to communicate. You need to be a good basketball player to do that but it is not flashy and does not show up in the box score. It only helps your team win. He can do this because he is a good ball handler and is too strong for guards to pressure him. He also is the one often trusted with inbounding the ball under the basket. Once again this year we have scored on several out of bounds plays. That occurred often in Coach Marlin's first year here but not as frequently in recent years. Good to see that come back as a strength. Bryce also is often asked to defend guys either taller or quicker than he and does not back down to a challenge. He is also excellent at blocking out when trying to get position to rebound. That is how he averages so many rebounds when most inside guys he competes with are taller than he. He does need to improve his Free throw shooting. I think that could be accomplished by slowing himself down at the line and simply focusing more. He tends to shoot it quickly after getting the ball from the official. I don't want to have that improvement opportunity detract from the message however. He is a better basketball player than many will realize due to the things he does which you can not measure other than in the win loss column. By the way those skills are what attracted the staff to him when he was still a junior at St. Augustine High School. Recruiting is not all about what star level you are rated at or what your stats are. It is not also about how much impact you will make in Year 1. Part of it is about recognizing how will a guy fit into a system and being able to see what a guy can be with a couple of years of development. We knew Bryce was a good player when he got here but I don't think any of us believed he would be putting up the double double nos. he is now. I am not even sure the staff did.