Wooden Top 50 watch list unveiled
— -- Duke freshman Jahlil Okafor and Wisconsin's Frank Kaminsky anchor this year's Wooden Award Preseason Top 50 watch list, which was announced on ESPN on Monday.
Louisville's Montrezl Harrell and point guards Fred VanVleet and Marcus Paige, all Associated Press first-team preseason All-Americans, are also included.
Okafor is one of seven freshmen on this season's list. There were nine freshmen on the preseason watch list in 2013-14, the first season that freshmen and transfers were added to the candidate pool.
Kansas ( Wayne Selden Jr., Cliff Alexander, Perry Ellis and Kelly Oubre) and Kentucky ( Willie Cauley-Stein, Andrew Harrison, Aaron Harrison and Karl Anthony-Towns), the No. 1 team in the Associated Press and USA Today preseason polls, each have four players on this year's watch list.
Of the 50 players on the watch list, 22 will compete in the Tip-Off Marathon on the ESPN family of networks.
The list will be reduced to 25 players in January, and the finalists will be announced in March. Players who were not included on the preseason list can be added in the next rounds. The best example of the latter is former Indiana star Victor Oladipo, who wasn't included on the midseason list in 2012-13 but was a finalist for the award.
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