UH men’s basketball guard Caleb Mills drives through the lane with a USF defender right on his side. He was the scoring leader for Houston in 2019-20 averaging 13.2 points per contest. | Kathyrn Lenihan/The Cougar
The American Athletic Conference announced its preseason awards for men’s basketball on Wednesday morning, and there were a lot of positive predictions for Houston.
The Cougars were named the preseason favorite to win the conference in the AAC Coaches’ Preseason Poll, which is the second year in a row where they are predicted to be at the top after they were co-favorites with Memphis a season ago.
UH received nine first-place votes from the AAC’s head coaches for a total of 99 points. Second place Memphis finished with 90 points.
Other AAC schools received the following votes: SMU (80), Cincinnati (77), USF (61), Tulsa (50), Wichita State (44), UCF (37), ECU (34), Temple (18) and Tulane (15).
Caleb Mills
Sophomore guard Caleb Mills was named the American’s Preseason Player of the Year. He was one of only two unanimous selections to the conference’s preseason first team.
The 6-foot-3-inch guard was also named to the AAC’s Preseason First Team for 2020-21. He was the only Houston player to be on either the first or second All-AAC teams.
Mills is joined in the first team by Cincinnatti guard Keith Williams, SMU guard Kendric Davis, Tulsa guard Brandon Rachal and ECU forward Jayden Gardner.
The five on the All-AAC preseason second team are Cincinnati center Chris Vogt, Memphis forward D.J. Jeffries, Memphis guard Landers Nolley II, USF forward Alexis Yetna and SMU guard Tyson Jolly.
