SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – With the women's college basketball season on the horizon, Columbia's Abbey Hsu has been named to the 2023-24 Jersey Mike's Naismith Women's Player of the Year Watch List. First handed out in 1983, the Naismith Trophy recognizes the best player in all of college basketball.
Fifty players from around the country were named to the preseason watch list that also includes Iowa's Caitlin Clark, the winner of last year's award. Other recent winners include Aliyah Boston (2022), Paige Bueckers (2021) and Sabrina Ionescu (2020).
Hsu and Toledo's Quinesha Lockett are the only two players named to the watch list from mid-major conferences.
The Naismith Trophy is the third watch list Hsu has been named to this preseason. She was also named to the Ann Meyers Drysdale Award Watch List, recognizing the top shooting guard in women's NCAA Div. I college basketball. Her Hoop Stats later named Hsu to the Becky Hammon Mid-Major Player of the Year Award Watch List.
Hsu is coming off a season in which she scored 606 points (17.8 points per game) and broke the Ivy League's single-season record for made 3-pointers for the second year in a row – she made 112 last season and 108 the year prior. With 285 triples in her career, Hsu sits just two away from the Ivy League record of 287, currently held by Katie Benzan (Harvard, 2016-20). She was also named a unanimous First Team All-Ivy League selection, First Team All-Met (Metropolitan Basketball Writers Association), a semifinalist for the Becky Hammon Mid-Major Player of the Year Award and was selected to USA Basketball's 2023 Women's AmeriCup Team in June.
Entering the 2023-24 season, Hsu ranks No. 2 among active NCAA Div. I player in 3-pointers made per game (3.06) and No. 3 in total treys (285). She has 1,515 career points in three seasons, 177 assists and 114 steals, averaging 16.3 points per game, 41.7 percent from the field and 38.4 percent from the perimeter. Her 1,515 points rank second in program history behind all-time Columbia basketball scoring leader Camille Zimmerman '18CC, who scored 1,973, the most of any men's or women's player in school history.
The Lions begin the 2023-24 seaosn on Monday at Stony Brook. Tip-off is set for 6:30 p.m. ET.
About the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame
Located in Springfield, Massachusetts, the city where basketball was born, the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame is an independent non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to promoting, preserving and celebrating the game of basketball at every level – men and women, amateur and professional players, coaches and contributors, both domestically and internationally. The Hall of Fame museum is home to more than 400 inductees and over 40,000 square feet of basketball history. Nearly 200,000 people visit the Hall of Fame museum each year to learn about the game, experience the interactive exhibits and test their skills on the Jerry Colangelo "Court of Dreams." Best known for its annual marquee Enshrinement Ceremony honoring the game's elite, the Hall of Fame also operates over 70 high school and collegiate competitions annually throughout the country and abroad. For more information on the Basketball Hall of Fame organization, its museum and events, visit hoophall.com, follow @hoophall or call 1-877-4HOOPLA.
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