KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Senior forward Kobe Brown was the only Mizzou basketball player honored by Southeastern Conference coaches for the SEC Men’s Basketball Awards.
Brown, who averaged 15.9 points and 6.2 rebounds while shooting 45.3% from three-point range, was chosen as the SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year.
He is the first Tigers player to receive the honor since MU joined the conference in 2012.
According to a release from the program, Brown boasts a 3.6 grade-point average and plans to pursue a career in psychology.
Brown also was among eight All-SEC First Team selections along with SEC Player of the Year Brandon Miller, SEC Defensive Player of the Year Liam Robbins, Florida’s Colin Castleton, Kentucky’s Oscar Tschiebwe, Mississippi State’s Tolu Smith, Tennessee’s Santiago Vescovi and Texas A&M’s Wade Taylor IV.
Miller also was the conference’s Freshman of the Year.
Brown is MU's fifth first-team all-conference player since joining the SEC and the first since Dru Smith in 2021.
The Tigers tied the program record with an 11-7 SEC record and finished Dennis Gates’ first season in Columbia 23-8 overall, moving back into the AP Top 25 on Monday at No. 25.
Despite Mizzou’s stunning turnaround, Gates wasn’t the SEC Coach of the Year, an honor that Texas A&M’s Buzz Williams and Vanderbilt’s Jerry Stackhouse shared.
No Tigers landed on the second team or the SEC All-Defensive Team.
Senior guard D’Moi Hodge, who averaged 14.3 points, was a notable omission from the defensive list after he led the SEC in steals per game (2.7) and set a Mizzou record for steals in a season (83).
The Tigers, who earned a double-bye in the SEC Men's Basketball Tournament for the first time in program history, have a bye to the quarterfinals. It's only the fourth quarterfinal appearance in program history and first since 2020-21.
Mizzou, the No. 4 seed, will open SEC tourney play at 2 p.m. against the winner between Tennessee and either South Carolina or Mississippi on ESPN.
