Wellington Saints import takes ANBL award

Wellington Saints American import Erron Maxey has been named best sixth man in the Australian National Basketball League.

Maxey, who played for the Gold Coast Blaze during the 2009-10 season, headed off Tall Blacks Mika Vukona (also Gold Coast) and Phill Jones (Cairns) in voting for the awards. In 28 regular season games for the Blaze, Maxey averaged 13.7 points and 6.4 rebounds.

He made an impressive 48 per cent of his shots from the field, 40.8 per cent from three-point range, and 75.9 per cent from the foul line as the Blaze reached the semifinals.

Maxey made an impressive debut in the New Zealand NBL scoring 25 points for the Saints and played again against North Harbour last night.

Townsville Crocodiles American star Corey Williams won the Andrew Gaze Trophy as the NBL's most valuable player.

Williams averaged 18.6 points, 5.0 rebounds, and 4.1 assists to head Adelaide 36ers forward Adam Ballinger and Melbourne Tigers forward Mark Worthington for the main prize.

New Zealanders fared well in the annual awards with New Zealand Breakers forward Dillon Boucher the first Kiwi to win defensive player of the year.

Breakers guard Kirk Penney polled equal votes with Williams for the shooting guard positions in the All Star Five, which also included Tywain McKee (Wollongong), Worthington and Shawn Redhage (Perth).

And former Wellington Saints coach Gordie McLeod (Wollongong Hawks) was named coach of the year.

- © Fairfax NZ News