Leslie Gets MVP Award

After dominating the regular season, Spark center Lisa Leslie was an easy choice for the WNBA most-valuable-player-award, which she was presented Sunday by Val Ackerman, the league president.

Leslie received 51 first-place votes (out of 60) and totaled 563 points to finish ahead of Houston’s Tina Thompson (355) and Sacramento’s Yolanda Griffith (190). Minnesota’s Katie Smith and New York’s Tara Phillips completed the top five.

In helping the Sparks to their second consecutive 28-4 regular season, Leslie finished second in scoring (19.5) and blocked shots (2.29), and third in rebounding (9.6). During the season she passed Houston’s Cynthia Cooper as the WNBA’s all-time leading scorer. Leslie now has 2,670 points.

She also is the first player to win the league MVP and All-Star game MVP in the same season.

“When you think of the phrase ‘most valuable player’ in the sport of basketball a whole lot of things come to mind,” Ackerman said. “You imagine a player of incredible accomplishment on the court, who is truly at the top of her game, who does it all. There’s no facet of the game an MVP doesn’t excel at.

“When you think WNBA MVP in the year 2001, you think of Lisa Leslie. What a career, what a player, what a year.”

After receiving the trophy from Ackerman, Leslie said her teammates contributed as much as she did to earning her award.

“Tamecka Dixon came to me early in the season and said, ‘This going to be your year and I’m gonna make sure I get you the ball as much as I can,”’ Leslie said. “Ukari Figgs came to me to make sure how she could get me a pass when we run our slice play. Rhonda Mapp said she would push me every day in practice.

“My teammates totally prepared me for this moment. They said I was going to be MVP, and we worked hard in practice to make sure I could be at my best. I am very thankful to them.”

Leslie received $25,000 from the league for winning the award and was presented a 2002 Buick Rendezvous SUV worth $33,672.