Bogut, Augustus win Wooden awards

LOS ANGELES (AP) Utah's Andrew Bogut and LSU's Seimone Augustus were runaway winners of the John R. Wooden awards, presented Saturday to college basketball's players of the year.

The pair swept the top individual honors this season.

Bogut, a 7-foot sophomore center from Australia, became the first non-American to win the men's award, collecting 4,314 points from a national panel of over 1,000 voters of sports media members and college basketball experts. Duke's J.J. Redick was second with 3,552 points.

Augustus, a 6-foot-1 junior guard, received 422 points from a panel of more than 200 voters to win the women's award. Monique Currie of Duke was second with 155 points.

"The John R. Wooden award is the most prestigious in basketball," said Bogut, who has already decided to give up his final two years of college eligibility to enter the NBA draft, where he's expected to be one of the top picks.

The award was first presented in 1977 - two years after Wooden retired as the coach at UCLA, where he led the Bruins to 10 NCAA championships in his last 12 years on the job.

Now 94, Wooden didn't attend the award ceremony, but was expected at a banquet Saturday night.

Dee Brown of Illinois finished third in the men's voting with 3,003 points, followed by Sean May of NCAA champion North Carolina with 2,806; Wayne Simien of Kansas with 2,707; Chris Paul of Wake Forest with 2,659; Salim Stoudamire of Arizona with 2,395; Hakim Warrick of Syracuse with 2,257; Francisco Garcia of Louisville with 1,178, and Deron Williams of Illinois with 1,016.

Augustus became the second woman to receive the Wooden Award - Duke's Alana Beard won it last year.

"It's at the top because it has John Wooden's name on it," Augustus said. "He's a basketball icon as well as a legend."

Kendra Wecker of Kansas State finished third in the women's voting with 130 points; followed by Janel McCarville of Minnesota with 94 and Jessica Davenport of Ohio State with 92.

The top five in both categories attended the nationally televised ceremony at the Los Angeles Athletic Club.