SPOKANE, Wash. – Junior Chris Banchero, who led the Seattle Pacific men's basketball team to the Great Northwest Athletic Conference championship, received the Daktronics NCAA Division II West Region Player of the Year award on Wednesday.
 
Banchero, who helped the 18th-ranked Falcons (22-5) earn their sixth straight postseason berth, out-pointed guard Jordan Lawley of UC San Diego 121-93 to earn the player-of-the-year honor.

On Monday, Banchero was named the GNAC Player of the Year. The 6-foot-1 point guard from Seattle's O'Dea High School led SPU with 19.5 points per game. He registered double-figure points in 24 games. Banchero topped all SPU scorers 17 times and reached the 20-point plateau on 15 occasions.
 
He poured in 33 points against Alaska Anchorage (Jan. 28) and amassed a career-high 34 against Central Washington (Feb. 25).

Banchero twice hit game-winning shots, on Jan. 14 at Western Oregon and Feb. 20 at Montana State Billings.

Joining Banchero and Lawley on the West Region first team all-star squad were Saint Martin's forward Blake Poole, Western Washington guard Morris Anderson and Cal State San Bernardino forward Bryan LeDuc.
 
Included on the West Region's second team was SPU senior Brandon Larrieu (Puyallup, Wash./Franklin Pierce HS). The 6-foot wing player was the Falcons' second-leading scorer at 15.8 points per game. Larrieu received first-team All-GNAC acclaim on Monday.
 
Rounding out the second team were forward Lucas Alves of BYU-Hawaii, guard Zac Tiedeman of Humboldt State, guard Austin Swift of Cal Poly Pomona and forward Derrick Webb of Western Washington.  Alves was the West Region Player-of-the-Year last season.

Players selected to the all-region first team will now be listed on the Daktronics All-America national ballot.  The All-America team will be announced later this month.

The selections are made by the sports information directors at the region's schools that sponsor men's basketball.   The team is sponsored by Daktronics, Inc., an acknowledged world leader in scoring, timing and programmable display systems for virtually every sport at every level of competition.

The Seattle Pacific men are seeded third in the West Region and open NCAA Tournament play Friday in Bellingham against No. 6 seed BYU-Hawaii (20-5). Tip-off is 12:30 p.m. at Western Washington's Carver Gymnasium.
 
 
2010 DAKTRONICS WEST REGION MEN'S BASKETBALL ALL-STAR TEAM

Player of the Year -- Chris Banchero, Seattle Pacific

First Team
Chris Banchero, Seattle Pacific (G, 6-1, Jr., Seattle, Wash.)
Jordan Lawley, UC San Diego (G, 6-4, Sr., Lodi, Calif.)
Morris Anderson, Western Washington (G, 6-3, Sr., Federal Way, Wash.)
Blake Poole, Saint Martin's (F, 6-5, Jr., Eugene, Ore.)
Bryan LeDuc CSU San Bernardino (F, 6-8, Sr., Corona, Calif.)

Second Team
Zac Tiedeman, Humboldt State (G, 6-1, Sr., Santa Rosa, Calif.)
Austin Swift, Cal Poly Pomona (G, 6-5, Sr., Santa Cruz, Calif.)
Brandon Larrieu, Seattle Pacific (G, 6-0, Sr., Puyallup, Wash.)
Lucas Alves, BYU-Hawaii (F, 6-9, Sr., Case Branca, Brazil)
Derrick Webb, Western Washington  (F, 6-3, Sr., Port Orchard, Wash.)