Alexander named 2018 Skip Prosser Man of the Year
Kirk Downs, Lipscomb Athletics |
Lipscomb head men’s basketball coach Casey Alexander was named the 2018 Skip Prosser Man of the Year at the annual CollegeInsider.com awards banquet over the weekend at the Final Four in San Antonio, Texas.
“I didn’t know Skip Prosser personally, but I do know he was an accomplished, highly respected and well-liked coach that influenced the lives of many,” Alexander said. “It is an honor to win an award that bears his name.”
Alexander led the Purple and Gold to new heights in 2017-18 as the Bisons won their first-ever ASUN Championship and advanced to the program’s first-ever NCAA Tournament.
Lipscomb finished the year 23-10, which is the most wins in the program’s NCAA era and the first time the Bisons have posted back-to-back 20-win seasons. They also led the ASUN Conference in scoring offense (82.1) for the second consecutive season and had two players – Garrison Mathews and Rob Marberry – earn First Team All-ASUN honors.
“I appreciate CollegeInsider.com and everything they do for our game, especially for mid-major programs like ours,” Alexander said. “A head coach is only as good as his assistants and players allow him to be. I am very grateful for the group I get to work with every single day.
After being tabbed to finish second in the ASUN preseason poll by the league’s coaches, the Bisons lived up to that billing with a 10-4 mark in conference action to only finish behind league champ FGCU. It is the third time in five seasons that the Bisons have chalked up double-digit wins in ASUN play.
Down the stretch, however, there was no team hotter than Lipscomb. The Bisons won 12 of their final 13 games heading into the NCAA Tournament, including an 8-game win streak that featured a record-breaking 108-96 victory over the top-seeded Eagles in the ASUN Title game in Fort Myers, Florida to send the Bisons dancing.
“Casey Alexander has built Lipscomb into a perennial contender and he has done it the right way,” CollegeInsider.com’s Angela Lento said. “His program has been strong both on the court and in the classroom and he has always conducted himself in a first-class manner. He is a very deserving recipient of this award, which extends well beyond the X’s and O’s.”
Alexander was one of 16 coaches named as a finalist for the Skip Prosser Man of the Year Award that included Virginia’s Tony Bennett, Michigan’s John Beilein, Xavier’s Chris Mack and TCU’s Jamie Dixon among others.
The Skip Prosser Award was established in 2008 to honor those who not only achieve success on the basketball court but who display moral integrity off of it as well. The award is named after the late Skip Prosser, who died suddenly in 2007 while the head coach at Wake Forest.
Prosser posted a career record of 291-146 in 14 seasons as a head coach at Loyola, Xavier and Wake Forest. During his time at Wake, Prosser’s teams averaged 21 wins per season while playing in the Atlantic Coast Conference.
Just wrapping up his fifth season at the helm of the Lipscomb program, Alexander owns 108 career victories, which is the 20th-most all-time by an ASUN head coach. That total also ranks him second among active ASUN head coaches trailing only North Florida’s Matthew Driscoll (147).
Established in 2007-08, Alexander is the first ASUN head coach to ever be named the Skip Prosser Man of the Year.
“We are really proud of Casey and happy that he has been recognized in this way,” Lipscomb Director of Athletics Philip Hutcheson said. “Among the many lessons we hope that our student athletes learn while at Lipscomb, the belief that competitiveness and character are not mutually exclusive terms is a big one.
“From the start of his time here, Casey has worked to recruit, coach and build a culture that values excellence in the classroom, competition and in character development. We believe that excellence in these areas is a worthy pursuit and is reflective of the mission not only of our athletics department, but also of our university as a whole. I appreciate Casey's teaching of this to our student athletes in both word and deed and want to congratulate him on this high honor.”