Five Oklahoma Players Land Big 12 Honors

Madi Williams is first-team All-Big 12, Taylor Robertson and Ana Llanusa got second-team, Skylar Vann is top sixth man, and Beatrice Culliton received freshman accolades.
Five Oklahoma Players Land Big 12 Honors
Five Oklahoma Players Land Big 12 Honors

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By OU Media Relations

Madi Williams' second consecutive unanimous selection to the All-Big 12 First Team highlighted Oklahoma postseason award haul, as five different Sooners earned Big 12 honors as voted on by the league's coaches, the Big 12 announced Monday.

Along with Williams' first-team selection, Taylor Robertson and Ana Llanusa were named second-team All-Big 12 honorees. Skylar Vann was an All-Big 12 honorable mention. In addition, Vann won the league's Sixth Player Award for the second consecutive season, while Beatrice Culliton earned a spot on the Big 12 All-Freshman team.

The five different Sooners honored were the most of any team in the league and the most for an OU team since 2018. The Sooners, who went 14-4 in conference play, won a share of the program's first regular season title since 2009.

Williams' honor made her the sixth Sooner all-time to earn three first-team selections, joining Aaryn Ellenberg, Courtney Paris, Danielle Robinson, Stacey Dales and Phylesha Whaley. The redshirt senior forward led the Sooners with 15.7 points per game this season, also averaging 5.5 rebounds and 2.6 assists. Williams was the only player in the country to post 24.5 points, 9.0 rebounds and 4.0 assists per 40 minutes, solidifying her spot on the league's first team. She was one of four unanimous selections to the 2023 All-Big 12 First Team.

Vann became the first player in Big 12 history to repeat as the league's Sixth Player of the Year. The Edmond, OK, product was instrumental in Oklahoma's first conference championship since 2009, averaging 11.1 points and a team-high 6.9 rebounds per game in 29 games off the bench for the Sooners. Her 16 games of double-digit points off the bench were the most of any Big 12 player this season, and the forward was the only player in Division I to average 11.0 points and 6.0 rebounds per game without a start.

Robertson closes her Oklahoma career as a four-time All-Big 12 honoree, making her the eighth Sooner all-time to do so. The sharpshooter led the Big 12 in 3-point percentage and 3-pointers made, connecting on 81 treys at a 42.9 percent clip. She set a new NCAA career 3-point record this season, passing Ohio State's Kelsey Mitchell's record of 497, and Robertson enters the postseason with 527 career treys.

Llanusa earned postseason honors for the first time since 2019. A now three-time Big 12 honoree, Llanusa posted a team-high five 20-point games vs. Big 12 opponents this season. The guard averaged 12.3 points, 3.6 rebounds and 3.0 assists in her sixth season at Oklahoma.

Culliton's strong push over the season's final month landed her on the league's All-Freshman Team. The true freshman center averaged 4.0 points, 2.9 rebounds and 1.2 assists throughout the season. Her player efficiency rating of 18.3 ranked fourth among all Big 12 freshmen that played at least 20 games, and a 10-assist output in a win over Texas Tech made her the first freshman center nationally since at least 2009 to dish out double-digit assists in a game. The Sooners have now had at least one player named to the All-Freshman team in seven consecutive seasons.

The Sooners won their first Big 12 regular season championship since 2009 this year, sharing the title with Texas. 

Oklahoma is the No. 2 seed at this week's Phillips 66 Big 12 Championship and tip off in the Big 12 quarterfinal against No. 7-seeded Kansas or No. 10-seeded TCU at 5 p.m. Friday in Kansas City.

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John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

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