Jahii Carson named ESPN’s Freshman of the Month

Jahii Carson was named the January national freshman of the month by ESPN on Friday. The Mesa high school product joins Marcus Smart of Oklahoma State and Anthony Bennett of UNLV as the third recipient of the award this year.

Carson averaged 17.5 points per game and 4.6 assists per game throughout the first month of the 2013 calendar year. The award comes after a road win against Washington State in which Carson scored 25 points, including 21 in the second half and committed zero turnovers to lead the team to victory. On Thursday, Carson was also added to the U.S. Basketball Writers Association Freshman of the Year watch list.

Coming into the weekend, Carson ranked first in free throws made and attempted among freshman making 91 of 127 from the line, second in minutes per game (36.5), third in assists (5.5), and fourth in scoring averaging 17.3 points per game.

This season, Carson has ten 20-point scoring efforts and 111 assists, only four assists short of breaking the Sun Devil freshman assist record held by Bobby Thompson with 114.

For the first time since 1994, ASU is 6-2 in conference, and the team’s 17-4 start is their best since Alton Lister, Byron Scott, and Fat Lever helped ASU to a 19-2 record to begin the season in 1981.

Carson and ASU will be on a national stage Saturday night when they face the University of Washington on ESPNU at 7p.m. MST. It will be a tough road test for the Sun Devils as Washington is coming off a close loss at home to Arizona and Hec Edmundson Pavilion is known as the toughest place to play in the Pac-12.

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