For the second year in a row, Kaleb Wesson earned honors from the Big Ten.
After getting named honorable mention all-conference a year ago, the junior big man was voted a second-team All-Big Ten selection by both coaches and media on Monday after the regular season wrapped up.
The first-team picks were made up of Iowa's Luka Garza, Maryland's Jalen Smith, Michigan State's Cassius Winston, Penn State's Lamar Stevens and Maryland's Anthony Cowan Jr. (coaches) and Illinois' Ayo Dosunmu (media). Wesson was joined by Michigan's Zavier Simpson, Michigan State's Xavier Tillman, Minnesota's Daniel Oturu, Cowan (media) and Dosunmu (coaches) on the second team.
Wesson, who underwent a body transformation in the offseason to cut more than 30 pounds, leads the Buckeyes in both scoring and on the glass. He's averaging 14 points and 9.3 rebounds, doing so by increasing stamina and cutting his foul rate to play a career-high 29.5 minutes per game. The 6-foot-9, 255-pounder, who has started in all 31 games, is also recording 1.9 assists, one block and 0.7 steals per game.
More so than in any previous season, a large portion of Wesson's offense has come from behind the 3-point arc, where he's shooting 42.5 percent. He's hitting 44.4 percent of his shots from the field.
His more diverse offensive game combined with more activity on the defensive end of the court has made him one of the conference's most productive big men.
“Kaleb today, I think, was who he is and that is one of the best bigs in the country,” Holtmann said after Wesson's 23-point, 12-rebound performance at Michigan on Feb. 4. “Sometimes he can have games where he struggles, just like everybody else. But he played like one of the best big men in the country.”
Wesson has recorded 11 double-doubles this season.
Wesson and the Buckeyes will tip off their next game at 6:30 p.m. Thursday when they take on Purdue in the second round of the Big Ten tournament.
