Two Coug basketballers make All-Academic team

COUGAR BASKETBALLERS Nikola Koprivica and Abe Lodwick have been named to the 2010 Pac-10 Men’s Basketball All-Academic Teams. Their inclusion marks the fourth straight season the Cougars have placed multiple student-athletes on the first and/or second all-academic conference teams. Washington State’s two honorees are also the second-most among Pac-10 schools.

To be eligible for selection to the academic team, a student-athlete must have a minimum 3.0 overall grade-point average and be either a starter or significant contributor.

For Nikola Koprivica, he was named to the first team for the second-straight season, and picked up his third-straight Pac-10 all-academic honor. Abe Lodwick earned second team accolades for the first time.

Over the last four seasons, WSU has earned all-academic honors 14 times. Last year, four Cougars were named to the all-academic first team.

A native of Belgrade, Serbia, Koprivica is majoring in International Business with a 3.32 grade point average. This is the senior's third-consecutive all-academic honor after being named to the second team as a sophomore in 2008 and the first team last season as a junior.

Playing at the power forward position for the first time in his career, Koprivica ranked third in the conference with a .426 3-point field goal percentage as he made 43 of 101 attempts. As a senior Koprivica nearly doubled his number of 3-pointers made his first three seasons and scored 19 more points than he did in his first three years (276 points as a senior).

The Cougs' lone upperclassman, Koprivica played all 31 games, starting 10, while averaging 25.2 minutes per outing.

He ranked fourth on the team with 8.9 points a game and 15th in the Pac-10 and tied for second on the team with 5.1 rebounds per game.

Lodwick, a redshirt sophomore from Bend, Ore. is a communication major with a 3.26 grade point average. Lodwick played in 28 of the team’s 31 games, with 21 starts.

He averaged 2.5 points and 2.5 rebounds after moving from the small forward to the power forward position this season. He had his best Pac-10 scoring performance with 11 points at home against USC (Feb. 20). Against Portland State on Dec. 19, Lodwick scored a career-high 13 points and grabbed eight rebounds. Over his career, Lodwick is averaging nearly two points and two rebounds an outing in 49 games.