Friday, March 12, 2010

MACON, Ga. - Three Atlantic Sun men's basketball head coaches, Jacksonville's Cliff Warren, ETSU's Murry Bartow and Campbell's Robbie Laing received national recognition for their work this season.

After leading the Fighting Camels to their first-ever conference regular season championship, Laing's accomplishments have been recognized by the National Association of Basketball Coaches (NABC) and The Sporting News.

Laing was named NABC District 3 Coach of the Year, one of 24 nationwide to receive that honor. He also was tabbed the Atlantic Sun Conference Coach of the Year by The Sporting News. Earlier this month, Laing was also recognized as the A-Sun's top coach in voting by conference coaches and sports information directors.

Laing guided the Camels to a school Division I era (since 1977-78) records for regular season victories (19) and conference wins (14). In addition, the Camels secured non-conference victories over the likes of Appalachian State (Southern Conference runner-up) and East Carolina (Conference USA), while holding a lead in the second half against ACC member Virginia Tech.

Warren has been named a finalist for the inaugural Ben Jobe Coach of the Year Award presented by Collegeinsider.com.

The Ben Jobe Award was created to recognize the top minority coach in the country. The award is named for coaching legend Ben Jobe, who spent the majority of his career at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, won 524 games in 31 years. He is best known for his accomplishments at Southern University, where he took the program to four NCAA Tournament appearances and one NIT berth.

Warren joins an elite group of finalists that comprises of Tommy Amaker (Harvard), Mike Anderson (Missouri), Tevester Anderson (Jackson State), Tony Barbee (UTEP), Todd Bozeman (Morgan State), Ed Cooley (Fairfield), Mike Davis (UAB), Stan Heath (South Florida), Ron Hunter (IUPUI), Sydney Johnson (Princeton), Johnny Jones (North Texas), Marvin Menzies (New Mexico State), Shaka Smart (VCU) and John Thompson III (Georgetown).

Bartow joins 14 other finalists for the 2010 Skip Prosser Award. The Skip Prosser Award was established last year to honor recipients who not only achieve success on the basketball court but who display moral integrity off of it as well. Prosser posted a career record of 291-146 in 14 seasons as a head coach. During his time at Wake Forest, his teams averaged 21 wins per season while playing in arguably the nation's most difficult league, the Atlantic Coast Conference.

In his seven seasons at ETSU, Bartow has been highly successful, leading the Bucs to five conference championships, four postseason tournaments (three NCAAs and one NIT), and four 20-win seasons. In fact, he is the only ETSU head coach to ever lead the Bucs to three NCAA Tournaments.

The list of finalists includes Northwestern's Bill Carmody, Pittsburgh's Jamie Dixon, Temple's Fran Dunphy, Oakland's Greg Kampe, Murrray State's Billy Kennedy, Xavier's Chris Mack, Sam Houston State's Bob Marlin, Utah State's Stew Morrill, Portland's Eric Reveno, BYU's Dave Rose, Vanderbilt's Kevin Stallings, Butler's Brad Stevens, Wofford's Mike Young and Maine's Ted Woodward.