PORTLAND, Ore. – The Great Northwest Athletic Conference announced its Men's Basketball Preseason Coaches Poll on Thursday, featuring Seattle Pacific selected for a seventh-place finish in the conference.
Central Washington tied for third in last year's GNAC standings at 22-10 overall and 11-7 in league play. The Wildcats earned 90 points, including four first-place votes to top the poll. CWU edged second-place Montana State Billings by five points. The Yellowjackets won last year's GNAC regular-season title at 20-10 overall and 14-4 in league play. Northwest Nazarene rounded out the top three with 70 points.
Alaska Anchorage and Saint Martin's tied for fourth with 69 points and a first-place vote each. Western Washington also received a first-place vote but landed one spot ahead of the Falcons with 52 points. Simon Fraser, Western Oregon, and Alaska Fairbanks round out the GNAC Preseason Coaches Poll.
"We're excited about the makeup of our team entering the 2024-25 season," head coach
Keffrey Fazio said. "We have experienced returners along with new players that we expect to make an impact for us. Our guys have been working hard to prepare for our upcoming schedule. The GNAC is always very competitive and features a lot of well-coached teams. We can't wait for the season to begin and to compete against the other teams in the conference."
The Falcons finished the 2023-24 season with a 17-15 overall record and went 10-8 in conference play. They were dominant at Royal Brougham Pavilion, owning an 11-2 record at home last season. The Falcons finished fifth in the GNAC and qualified for the GNAC Tournament for the 12th time since the tournament began in 2011. It's the most of any team in the conference. It was the sixth consecutive appearance in the GNAC Tournament for SPU. The
Falcons were eliminated by the eventual tournament-winning Wildcats in the opening round.
The Falcons return nine players for the 2024-25 season. Standouts include
Owen Moriarty and
Trace Evans. Moriarty made an immediate impact in his first season with SPU. He appeared in and started 31 games in 2023-24. He averaged 10.4 points per game and shot 49.6 percent from the field. Moriarty totaled 89 rebounds and 56 assists. Defensively, he nabbed 28 steals, the most on the Falcons.
Evans returns to the Falcons and will be a presence in the paint. He appeared in and started 32 games last season. Evans averaged 9.3 points per game and had the second-best field goal percentage in the conference at 57.4 percent. He led the team in rebounding with 5.5 per game.
Jonas La Tour,
Nikias Schoenerstedt,
Julian Mora,
Logan Kinloch,
Jacob Gray,
Brian Caldera, and
David Zachman are back for the Falcons as well. La Tour shot 40.9 percent from 3-point range a season ago. Mora's returning to the court after missing time with an injury last season.
The Falcons welcomed seven new players in the 2024-25 recruiting class.
Grant Coleman,
Cole Holum,
Mason Landdeck,
Jaxon Nap, Hnery Sandberg,
Isaiah Sonntag, and
Aengus Sutherland make their SPU debut this season.
Nap and Landdeck bring collegiate experience to the roster. Nap played two seasons at the University of Montana. Nap appeared in 62 games for the Grizzlies, where he shot 44.9 percent from the field, grabbed 71 rebounds, and dished out 29 assists.
Landdeck played a season at Eastern Washington before transferring to Hawaii Pacific. He averaged 12.7 points per game, 3.8 assists per game, and pulled down 3.4 rebounds per game with the Sharks. Landdeck spent a season at Le Moyne College before joining the Falcons this season.
Sandberg and Soontag are exciting first-year players for the Falcons this season. Sandberg played four years of varsity basketball at Gonzaga Prep. Sandberg was an All-League Honorable Mention as a sophomore. As a junior, he made Second Team All-League and Second Team All-State. In his final year with Gonzaga Prep, he was named First Team All-League and Defensive Player of the Year.
Sonntag scored 1,200 career points at Puyallup High School, averaging 19 points per game over three seasons. He earned First Team All-SPSL North twice. He was named Second Team All-SPSL North once. Sonntag led the SPSL North in scoring as a sophomore.
The Falcons open their season in November. They'll hit the ground running, playing an exhibition and eight games in the first month of the 2024-25 season.
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