SEC announces awards for final week of regular season

Following the final week of regular-season SEC basketball, the conference released the last installment of weekly awards, which saw Texas A&M Aggies guard Quenton Jackson named SEC Player of the Week, while Auburn Tigers forward Jabari Smith was named SEC Freshman of the Week.

Smith, a freshman, has been among the nation’s best first-year players for Auburn, and this week was no different. Smith was a five-star recruit coming out of high school, according to the On3 Consensus, a complete and equally weighted industry-generated average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies, making him the No. 2 power forward in the 2021 recruiting class and the No. 1 player coming out of the state of Georgia. Last week, Smith led Auburn to two wins — one over Mississippi State and one over South Carolina — which helped the Tigers clinch the SEC regular-season title.

In the two wins last week, Smith averaged 24.0 points, 8.0 rebounds and 2.0 assists per game, and he even reached double figures for the third consecutive game with his performance against South Carolina. Smith now has 26 double-digit scoring games this season, including 13 20-point games. On the season, Smith is averaging 17.1 points, 6.9 rebounds and 1.8 assists per game.

Texas A&M was able to finish its season on a high note, going 20-11 overall with a 9-9 record in conference play, thanks in large part to huge performances from Jackson, who won SEC Player of the Week honors. Jackson, a fifth-year senior from Los Angeles, averaged 23.0 points, 3.0 rebounds and 2.5 steals across two games this week, as Texas A&M managed to beat both No. 25 Alabama and Mississippi State. He converted on 71.4 percent of his shots from the field this week, and Jackson scored 28 points in the win over Alabama, the most by any Texas A&M player since Danuel House had 32 points against Kentucky in the 2016 SEC Tournament Championship.

Jackson has scored in double figures in each of the last 13 games. This season, Jackson has averaged 14.5 points, 3.4 rebounds and 1.7 assists per game, as he’s turned up his game at the right time. Jackson willed Texas A&M to earning the No. 8 spot in the SEC Tournament, and the Aggies will face No. 9 Florida in the second round of play.