Arizona’s Tommy Lloyd was named Associated Press Coach of the Year on Friday, picking up his second major national coach of the year award.
The AP announced the choice of its 61 media voters on Friday before a press conference at the Final Four in New Orleans. Lloyd became the first Arizona coach and only the fourth Pac-12 coach to win the AP award.
During his introductory statement upon receiving the award, Lloyd said it was an "incredible honor," and thanked Arizona president Robert Robbins for playing a big role in him taking the UA job.
"This means a lot. I probably can't even process quite where it fits on the spectrum of things but I'm really proud," Lloyd said. "I"m proud of my staff. I'm proud of our players at Arizona and I'm proud to have been mentored by a great coach in (Gonzaga's) Mark Few. It's pretty crazy that his name's on some of these awards and mine's right underneath it."
On Tuesday, Lloyd was named the National Basketball Coaches Association coach of the year, triggering a school-paid $20,000 bonus in Lloyd's contract, while the United States Basketball Writers of America on Wednesday named Lloyd the winner of its Henry Iba Award for national coach of the year.
Lloyd led the Wildcats to a 33-4 record, Pac-12 regular-season and tournament titles, and a No. 1 NCAA Tournament seed. He has a clause in his contract paying him an extra $20,000 bonus if he wins any of the three major coach of the year awards, from the NABC, AP or Naismith.
The Naismith Award has still not named the winner of its coach of the year award. Lloyd is one of four finalists along with Texas Tech’s Mark Adams, Wisconsin’s Greg Gard, and Providence’s Ed Cooley.
