Key Picked For Lisa Leslie Award Preseason Watch List

Tennessee's Tamari Key is among 20 players named as preseason watch list candidates for the 2023 Lisa Leslie Award, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the Women's Basketball Coaches Association announced on Friday.

Named after the three-time All-American, 1994 National Player of the Year and Class of 2015 Hall of Famer, the annual award in its sixth year recognizes the top centers in women's NCAA Division I college basketball. A national committee of top college basketball personnel determined the watch list of 20 candidates.

"Lisa Leslie is one of the greatest basketball players of all time and her achievements at the collegiate, international and professional levels go largely unmatched by anyone in the game," said John L. Doleva, President and CEO of the Basketball Hall of Fame. "The centers that have been named to the Lisa Leslie Award Watch List this year are among the best in the game, and we are excited to watch them excel on the court. We thank Lisa for her involvement in this selection process."

With Key being in consideration for the Lisa Leslie Award, Tennessee is one of only three schools (Louisville and Texas are the others) with players at all five positions in the HoopHall Awards Women's Starting Five. Also in the running are Jasmine Powell (Nancy Lieberman Award), Jordan Horston (Ann Meyers Drysdale Award), Rickea Jackson (Cheryl MIller Award) and Jasmine Franklin (Katrina McClain Award).

A 6-foot-6 senior center, Key averaged career highs in points (10.5), rebounds (8.1) and blocks (3.5) while shooting 58.1 percent from the field in 2021-22. She carded 11 double-doubles as a junior, including a school-record second triple-double, turning in the eighth-most double-doubles ever by a Lady Vol.

The 2022 Lisa Leslie top-five finalist and a 2021 semifinalist blocked a UT-record 119 shots to surpass Kelley Cain's old mark of 113 and lead the NCAA with the No. 4 total in SEC history. Key raised her career blocks tally to a school-best 277, surpassing the 275 set by Candace Parker from 2005-08 and leaving her just 13 swats shy of entering the SEC career top 10 after only three seasons.

Key was named to the 2022 Coaches and Media All-SEC Second Teams and made the 2021 and 2022 SEC All-Defensive Teams. She also was a semifinalist for 2022 Naismith Women's Defensive Player of the Year.

Fans are encouraged to participate in Fan Voting, presented by Dell Technologies, in each of the three rounds starting today, October 21. In late January, the watch list of 20 players for the 2023 Lisa Leslie Award will be narrowed to 10 and then in late February to just five. In March the five finalists will be presented to Leslie and the Hall of Fame's selection committee where a winner will be selected.

The winner of the 2023 Lisa Leslie Award will be presented on a to-be-determined date, along with the other four members of the Women's Starting Five. Additional awards being presented include the Nancy Lieberman Award (Point Guard), Ann Meyers Drysdale Award (Shooting Guard), Cheryl Miller Award (Small Forward) and the Katrina McClain Award (Power Forward), in addition to the Men's Starting Five.

Previous winners of the Lisa Leslie Award are Aliyah Boston, South Carolina (2020-22), Megan Gustafson, Iowa (2019) and A'ja Wilson, South Carolina (2018).

For more information on the 2023 Lisa Leslie Award and the latest updates, visit hoophallawards.com and follow @hoophall and #LeslieAward on Twitter and Instagram.

2023 Lisa Leslie Award Candidates*

Quay Miller	Colorado	Aliyah Boston	South Carolina
Kennedy Brown	Duke	Francesca Belibi	Stanford
Mackenzie Holmes	Indiana	Lauren Betts	Stanford
Monika Czinano	Iowa	Tamari Key	Tennessee
Josie Williams	Louisville	Taylor Jones	Texas
Jessika Carter	Mississippi State	Ila Lane	UC Santa Barbara
Alexis Markowski	Nebraska	Dorka Juhasz	UConn
Lauren Ebo	Notre Dame	Elizabeth Kitley	Virginia Tech
Sedona Prince	Oregon	Emma Grothaus	Washington
Lucy Cochrane	Portland	Bella Murekatete	Washington State

*Players can play their way onto and off the list at any point in the 2022-23 season

About Lisa Leslie:
Widely regarded as the best player in the country during her senior year of high school, Leslie decided to play basketball close to home at University of Southern California. While at USC, she set Pac-10 records for scoring, rebounding and blocked shots, earning All-Pac-10 honors each of her four seasons.

In 1991, she was named national freshman of the year and went on to earn All-American Honors the following three seasons. In her senior season, she won multiple national player of the year awards, including the Naismith College Player of the Year and the WBCA Player of the Year.

In the summer of 1997, the Women's National Basketball Association was launched and with it, Lisa Leslie became a household name. The Los Angeles Sparks landed the hometown star, who would go on to help them win two world championships. As an eight-time All-Star and three-time MVP, Leslie became the face of the WNBA.

In 2002, she became the first player to dunk in a WNBA game. Leslie retired as the all-time leading rebounder in WNBA history and was an eight-time First Team All-WNBA performer. Internationally, Leslie won four gold medals in Olympic competition.

Since retiring from professional play, Leslie has worked as a sports commentator and analyst for several networks, while exploring fashion modeling and acting as well.

University of Tennessee | Official Athletics Site

Players Mentioned

Jasmine Franklin

Jordan Horston

Rickea Jackson

Tamari Key

Jasmine Powell

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