Pikiell becomes the first coach in school history to earn the MBWA Peter A. Carlesimo Coach of the Year AwardNew York, N.Y. - Senior guard Muhammad El-Amin (Lansing, Mich.) of the Stony Brook University men's basketball team has been named to the 2010 Division I All-Met first team, it was announced by the National Invitation Tournament (NIT) and the Met Basketball Writers Association (MBWA) on Wednesday. He is the first player in program history to earn first-team honors. In addition, Stony Brook head coach Steve Pikiell became the first coach in school history to earn the MBWA Peter A. Carlesimo Coach of the Year Award.
"I couldn't be prouder of Muhammad; he has worked hard at making himself a better player and I'm happy that he could be recognized for his hard work," Pikiell said. "I'm also extremely honored to be recognized among all the great coaches in this area. Our program could not have had the success we had this year without the great support of [Stony Brook Director of Athletics] Jim Fiore, our athletics' administration and the entire University community.
The first player in program history to earn America East Player of the Year honors, El-Amin set a Division I program record for points in a season this year (517). He also finished his two-year Seawolves career just 29 points short of 1,000. He ranked second in the America East in scoring during conference play (19.1 points per game) and scored 23 in the 82-78 victory over Vermont on Feb. 24 that clinched the Seawolves' first America East regular-season title.
El-Amin was also named the America East Player of the Year by Sporting News and was selected to the NABC District I second team. The first Stony Brook player to earn All-Met honors since D.J. Munir was named to the third team in 2003-04, El-Amin became the first player in program history to be named an AP Honorable All-America earlier this month.
In his fifth season at the helm, Pikiell guided SBU to a record-breaking 2009-10 season. In addition to claiming the schools first ever America East regular-season title, Stony Brook set Division I program records for overall wins (22) and conference wins (13) and earned its first postseason berth in its Division I history.
Named the America East Coach of the Year at the conference's annual awards banquet on March 5, Pikiell was also selected the America East Coach of the Year by Sporting News. Pikiell has led Stony Brook to 38 wins over the past two seasons and its first back-to-back winning seasons since the program jumped to Division I.
Voting for the All-Met teams was done by members of the media in the tri-state area.
