Kansas' Tyrel Reed Named Academic All-America® First Team
Feb. 22, 2011
TOWSON, Md. – Kansas senior Tyrel Reed was named to the Capital One Academic All-America® Men’s Basketball First Team, as selected by the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA) and released Tuesday.
A 6-3 guard, Reed has helped #3/2 Kansas post a 26-2 record this season. A pre-physical therapy and exercise science major with a 3.65 grade point average, Reed graduated from KU in 3.5 years.
“This is an amazing award and I’m just so excited about receiving it,” Reed said. “I wasn’t the one that was really in charge of it. I have to give all the credit to my academic advisors and my teammates for being on a good team and for them always supporting me.”
Reed has started all 28 games for the Jayhawks this season and ranks fourth on the team with a 9.8 scoring average. An excellent shooter, he has a .388 field goal percentage from three-point range and will finish his career as one of the best three-point shooters in school history. The Jayhawks’ top free throw shooter with an .831 mark, the Burlington, Kan. native was a member of the Jayhawks’ national championship team in 2008 and has played for three Big 12 Conference championship squads.
“Being named to the Academic All-America team shows that not only are you a basketball player but you have done your job in the classroom. My goal when I got here was to be the best student I could be and have something to fall back on when I am done with basketball. It’s just a really cool honor to get and I am very blessed,” Reed said.
This marks the second straight season Kansas has had an Academic All-America first-team selection. Last year, Cole Aldrich, Reed’s roommate during his three years at KU, was named the 2010 Academic All-America of the Year. Reed becomes KU’s 15th basketball Academic All-America first-team selection.
“What a great achievement for Tyrel,” Kansas head coach Bill Self said. “To have two guys on the first team back-to-back years is a great accomplishment to the academic support we have here for our guys. This honor is a testimony to how hard Tyrel has worked. I couldn’t be happier or more proud of an individual. To me this is bigger than making any athletic team.”
Reed is joined on the 2011 team by Butler’s Matt Howard, Notre Dame’s Tim Abromaitis, Northern Colorado’s Devon Beitzel and North Carolina’s Tyler Zeller. Howard was named the 2011 Capital One Academic All-America of the Year.
“I give a lot of credit to my parents,” Reed said of his father Stacey and mother Debbie. “They raised me and my sister (Lacie) in a household that fostered an environment that was conducive to learning and always wanting us to strive to do our best.”
KU’s All-Time Academic All-America Selections
1971 – Bud Stallworth
1974 – Tom Kivisto
1977 – Cris Barnthouse
1977 – Ken Koenigs
1978 – Ken Koenigs
1979 – Darnell Valentine
1980 – Darnell Valentine
1981 – Darnell Valentine
1982 – David Magley
1996 – Jacque Vaughn
1997 – Jacque Vaughn#
1997 – Jerod Haase
1999 – Ryan Robertson
2010 – Cole Aldrich#
2011 – Tyrel Reed
# – Academic All-America of the Year
