USBWA News Release
 
As head coach Jim Hayford joked with him last Saturday, just think what Austin McBroom could have accomplished with more than one day of practice and fully healthy last week.
 
McBroom, the perfect-fit puzzle piece for the Eastern Washington University men's basketball team in the 2015-16 season, has been selected by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association as its Oscar Robertson National Player of the Week for games ending the week of Sunday, Feb. 14. The USBWA's weekly honor is presented by Blue Ribbon College Basketball Yearbook.
 
McBroom, playing with a sore leg muscle, practiced just once last week before games against North Dakota and Northern Colorado. But he didn't show any effects, scoring 20 points in the first half against the Fighting Hawks "quicker than I've ever seen a player score 20 points," as Hayford would say later.
 
McBroom finished with 35 points in that game for a new career high, then broke it two days later with 37 against the Bears. No other player in school history – not NBA veteran Rodney Stuckey or NBA draftee Tyler Harvey – has scored more points in back-to-back Big Sky Conference games than McBroom.
 
"I guess we'll only let him practice one day the rest of the year because with a little rest, he's good for averaging 36 per game," quipped Hayford following the UNC game. Including his 11 assists which led to 26 additional Eagle points, McBroom had a hand in 98 of EWU's 192 points on the weekend (51 percent).
 
This is the second-straight season an Eagle has won the Oscar Robertson Award, with Harvey honored last year after scoring what was then a career-high 39 against Weber State and 16 in the next game against Idaho State. The only other Big Sky Conference player to be honored in the seven-year history of the award was Weber State's Damian Lillard, now with the Portland Trailblazers, in the 2011-12 season.

It was Harvey's early departure from the program which opened the doors for McBroom to transfer to EWU from Saint Louis. Harvey led NCAA Division I in scoring (23.1) and 3-pointers per game (4.00) a year ago, and McBroom isn't too far behind those marks. His 21.3 scoring average leads the Big Sky and ranks 14th in the nation, and his average of 3.71 treys per game are third nationally and first in the league. McBroom's shooting percentages – 46.0 percent overall, 43.8 percent from the 3-point arc and 82.5 percent from the free throw line are on par with Harvey's percentages of 46.9/43.1/85.2.
 
McBroom actually averages more assists per game (3.6 to 2.6) than Harvey, but they have a nearly identical assist-to-turnover ratio (+1.37 for McBroom and +1.28 for Harvey).
 
Currently, only Stuckey and Harvey had have better single-season scoring averages in school history. Stuckey averaged 24.6 as a sophomore in 2006-07 and 24.2 as a freshman in 2005-06, while Harvey averaged 23.1 last season as a junior and 21.8 as a junior.
 
McBroom came to EWU with 97 games and 45 starts worth of NCAA Division I experience -- he played in 66 games at Saint Louis (15 as a starter) and 31 (30 as a starter) at Central Michigan in 2011-12.
 
 
 

More on Austin McBroom . . .

The 6-foot-1 transfer from Saint Louis finished with a career-high 37 – 12^th-most in school history – in a 97-80 win over Northern Colorado on Saturday (Feb. 13). He made 10-of-16 shots from the field, 7-of-12 from the 3-point stripe and 10-of-11 from the free throw line to finish with his second-straight game of 35+ points. Including Thursday's (Feb. 11) 35-point outing in a 95-85 victory over North Dakota – his previous career high and now 23rd all-time – McBroom made 19-of-33 shots (58 percent), 12-of-20 3-pointers (60 percent) and 22-of-25 free throws (88 percent) in the sweep.
 
He also had six assists and six rebounds on Saturday, giving him 11 and 10, respectively in the two games. His 35 against North Dakota included 20 first-half points and, and overall shooting of 9-of-17 from the field, 5-of-8 from the 3-point stripe and 12-of-14 from the free throw line.
 
It was the third time in the last two years an Eagle has scored at least 72 points in back-to-back games. But it's the most in back-to-back Big Sky Conference games in school history, besting the 70 Rodney Stuckey, now with the Indiana Pacers in the NBA, had late in the 2006-07 season against Weber State (34) and Portland State (36). Last season, McBroom's Eagle teammate Venky Jois had 38 each in back-to-back games versus Eastern Oregon and Seattle, then Tyler Harvey had a total of 73 in consecutive games versus L-C State (34) and Weber State (39).

The most Harvey had in back-to-back league games was 61 last year against Northern Colorado (37) and North Dakota (24). The Big Sky record was set by Damian Lillard (now of the Portland Trailblazers), who had 75 in two games in February of 2012 (40 versus Portland State and 35 against Northern Colorado).
 
Harvey, the leading scorer in the nation a year ago, left EWU a year early and was drafted by Orlando in the NBA, and his position was essentially filled by McBroom.
 
"We had a gap in our program, and I don't think there was a graduate transfer in the country better than the player we were able to get," said Eastern head coach Jim Hayford. "We lost a player to the NBA, but our team is playing great basketball on the offensive side, this is in large part due to  because we added a player like Austin. I'm really glad he wanted to get his master's in communications here because he's made us a great offensive team."
 
McBroom is now averaging 21.3 points per game to rank first in the Big Sky and 14th in NCAA Division I. His scoring average currently ranks as the fifth-best in school history and his 511 total points are already 12th. In addition, his average of 3.71 3-pointers per game leads the league and is third nationally. His 89 total 3-pointers already ranks fourth all-time in single season school history. McBroom is also 14th in the nation in minutes per game with a league-leading 37.1 average, and he is 21st nationally and second in the Big Sky in 3-point percentage (.438). He is fifth in the league and 108th nationally in free throw percentage, making 104-of-126 for 82.5 percent (he was 10th nationally after making 19 of his first 20). He has upped his assists average to 3.6 per game, ranking eighth in the league.
 
The Eagles lost a pair of All-Big Sky guards from last year's NCAA Tournament team, but McBroom has provided an instant solution for the Eagles. He scored 76 points on Eastern's East Coast road trip, including 33 at Davidson on Dec. 11, 14 two nights later at Pitt and 29 on Dec. 14 at Western Carolina. His performance against Davidson included a 12-of-19 shooting night, and eclipsed his previous top game as an Eagle of 20 points (versus Pacific) and as a collegian of 26 points (for Saint Louis against Bradley on 11/29/14). He sank 10-of-17 shots from the field at Western Carolina, including 7-of-12 3-point attempts. His 19 points, five 3-pointers and five assists helped EWU win at San Francisco 81-77 on Dec. 1. He had a double-double with 19 points and 10 assists versus George Fox on Nov. 15.