Syracuse Basketball: Rakeem Christmas Named Finalist for Oscar Robertson Trophy

Since openly complaining about the lack of mid-season attention paid to the excellent year Syracuse's Rakeem Christmas is having, it seems the tide has shifted the opposite way. Maybe these committees read the blog. Maybe they decided to read a few box scores... but regardless of the reasoning behind it all, the honors are now coming for the stellar Orange senior. The latest one: Christmas was named a finalist for the Oscar Robertson Trophy.

Christmas was one of 15 finalists for the trophy, which is awarded by the U.S. Basketball Writers Association to the sport's most outstanding player on April 14. In total, the list featured four players from the ACC -- Christmas, Virginia's Malcolm Brogdon, Notre Dame's Jerian Grant and Duke's Jahlil Okafor. Our humble (not humble at all) league had twice as many nominees as any other in the nation. No Syracuse player has ever won the Oscar Robertson Trophy.

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So for those keeping track at home, Christmas can now be found on the lists for this award, the Lute Olson Award (most outstanding player who's suited up for at least two seasons), the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Award (best center) and the Naismith Trophy (most outstanding player). Nothing from the Wooden Award, which... dumb.

Syracuse has also done a nice job of capturing all of Rak's accolades on this awesome sub-site.

Congrats, Rak! And fingers crossed for you on all of these great honors. Well-deserved!