Feb. 28, 2000

UCLA senior forward Maylana Martin was announced by the Atlanta Tipoff Club as one of the 15 finalists for the 1999-2000 Naismith College Basketball Player of the Year Award.

Martin, a 6-3 senior from Perris, CA, was a first-team Kodak All-American and last season's Pac-10 Player of the Year. This season, she leads the Bruins in scoring (17.1 points per game) and rebounding (Pac-10 leading 8.6 rpg). With a current total of 2,005 career points, Martin is just the fifth Bruin player (men or women) to score over 2,000 points, joining Denise Curry (3,098), Don MacLean (2,608), Lew Alcindor (2,325) and Reggie Miller (2,095). Martin ranks second on UCLA's career scoring list and eighth on the Pac-10 all-time list. She also ranks fourth on the school list and 11th on the Pac-10 list with 889 career rebounds.

Also named as finalists are: Svetlana Abrosimova and Shea Ralph of Connecticut, Edwina Brown of Texas, Tamika Catchings and Semeka Randall of Tennessee, Katie Douglas of Purdue, Summer Erb of North Carolina State, Stacy Frese of Iowa State, Tamicha Jackson and Betty Lennox of Louisiana Tech, Kelly Miller of Georgia, Lynn Pride of Kansas, Ruth Riley of Notre Dame and Jackie Stiles of SW Missouri State.

The Naismith Awards program, now in its 32nd year, honors the outstanding college basketball players in the United States. The awards program was founded by the Atlanta Tipoff Club, an organization dedicated to recognizing the achievements of student-athletes in basketball. The Naismith Board of Selectors, which includes the country's leading basketball coaches, journalists and administrators, began the selection process earlier this year and have reduced the number of finalists by balloting to the 15 top male and female players they felt most deserving of the awards.

The winners of the Naismith Award, the most prestigious individual honor in college basketball, will be honored in Atlanta on April 8, 2000 at the Cobb Galleria Centre.