After winning the Conference USA regular season title on Saturday, the Charlotte women’s basketball program also cleaned up in the all-conference awards category announced by league officials Monday afternoon. Octavia Jett-Wilson was named the league’s Player of the Year, KeKe McKinney as the Defensive Player of the Year and Coach of the Year honors going to Head Coach Cara Consuegra. Jett-Wilson was named to the league’s all-conference first team, McKinney to the all-defensive team as well as an all-conference honorable mention. Newcomer Mikayla Boykin was tabbed to the league’s second team while floor general Jada McMillian earned her own all-conference honorable mention. The eight total awards by the Niners set a new school-record for most postseason honors.
Consuegra guided the Niners to a 19-9 season after starting off with a 4-6 record through the grueling non-conference part of the schedule early in the year. The 15-3 record in C-USA play were the most league victories in school history which started with eight-straight road wins. The season began with the record-setting 176th victory for Consuegra after the season-opening 63-45 win at Richmond. Charlotte currently sits third nationwide in three-point field goal defense only allowing made baskets from behind the arc just 23.9% of the time. In overall field goal percentage defense, the Niners ranked 11th at 35.1% with both categories leading Conference USA. The defensive efforts continued with leading the league in blocks shots with 132 averaging 4.71/game while finishing second in defensive rebounding per game at 27.18. In league games only, the Niners led every one of those categories being the league’s best scoring defense at 54.39 points/game, more than three points/game ahead of second. Consuegra notches her first Coach of the Year honor while becoming the second all-time in program history, the other being Amanda Butler back in 2005-06.
