Lofton left off Wooden team

The award, created in 1976, bestows itself as the "most prestigious individual honor in college basketball.''

According to a Wooden Award release issued Wednesday, Lofton received 7,600 votes out of nearly 50,000 votes.

A spokesman for the award said this is the first year the fans were entitled to vote, and that the team is determined by a panel of approximately 1,000 sportswriters and media members.

"I certainly would put Chris in the top 10 players in the country. But when you look at the list, you can understand why all those guys are on the list,'' UT coach Bruce Pearl said. "Chris is going to have an opportunity to come back next year and help us remain competitive nationally and he'll be featured. He's come a long way from Maysville, Ky.

"There's still more out there for the University of Tennessee and Chris Lofton.''

Coaches Mark Gottfried and Tubby Smith were the SEC's representatives on the Wooden Award's Board of Governors. Smith, of course, has since moved on to take the head coaching position at Minnesota.

This year's Wooden Award All-Americans, in alphabetical order: Arron Afflalo (UCLA), Aaron Brooks (Oregon), Kevin Durant (Texas), Nick Fazekas (Nevada), Tyler Hansbrough (North Carolina), Acie Law (Texas A&M), Joakim Noah (Florida), Greg Oden (Ohio State), Brandon Rush (Kansas) and Alando Tucker (Wisconsin).

The five finalists for the Wooden Award are Durant, Hansbrough, Law, Oden and Tucker.