ORLANDO, Fla. (UCFKnights.com) – Anchoring the UCF men's basketball team's defense all season long, sophomore Tacko Fall was named the American Athletic Conference Defensive Player of the Year, the league announced Wednesday.
Fall is just the fifth Knight ever to earn a major conference award, the first to do so since 2008-09, and joins Dexter Lyons as the only UCF players named as a conference Defensive Player of the Year.
With Fall at the forefront of what UCF does defensively, he has helped the Knights lead the nation in defensive field goal percentage all season long. UCF holds opponents to just 36.1 percent shooting from the floor and are fourth in the nation in allowing just 60.5 points per game.
Fall ranks third in The American in blocked shots with 2.6 per game and second in rebounding with 9.6 boards per contest. His 11 double-doubles are second among players in the league.
The second-year Knight has set multiple records this season, recently breaking the UCF single-season mark for blocked shots with 77. He also set a new UCF Division I era standard for rebounding, currently with 288 on the year.
Fall was named the American Athletic Conference Player of the Week once, earned a spot on the league's weekly honor roll twice and was named to the Charleston Classic All-Tournament Team after leading the Knights to the championship game and going 10-for-10 from the floor against No. 3 Villanova.
The fourth seeded Knights will open up play in the 2017 Frontier Communications American Athletic Conference Championship on Friday at 2 p.m. against fifth seeded Memphis. Coverage of the Knights' quarterfinal game against the Tigers will be on ESPN2 and FM 96.9 The Game.
UCF Major Award Winners
| 2016-17 | Tacko Fall | The American Defensive Player of the Year |
| 2008-09 | Jermaine Taylor | Conference USA Player of the Year |
| 2003-04 | Dexter Lyons | Atlantic Sun Defensive Player of the Year |
| 1997-98 | Mark Jones | Atlantic Sun Player of the Year |
| 1997-98 | Mark Jones | Atlantic Sun Newcomer of the Year |
| 1993-94 | Ochiel Swaby | Atlantic Sun Newcomer of the Year |
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