By Mike Lehman, TTU Sports Information
COOKEVILLE, Tenn. – Following a vote of Ohio Valley Conference head men's basketball coaches and communication directors, the League officially released its Preseason All-OVC Team and preseason poll Tuesday morning as part of its annual Media Day session.
As part of Tuesday's media day session, it was announced that Tennessee Tech senior guard Jayvis Harvey was named to the Preseason All-OVC Team. On hand in Evansville to represent the Golden Eagles with fifth-year head coach John Pelphrey was senior guard Diante Wood.
Harvey returns to Cookeville for his second season in the purple and gold, representing Tech's leading returning scorer, rebounder, and 3-point shooter. During his first stint with the Golden Eagles, the guard averaged 12.0 points, 3.6 rebounds, and 2.3 assists in 31.1 minutes per game.
The Durham, N.C. native led Tech and ranked second in the OVC while shooting 43.9 percent from distance. Harvey paired up with former teammates Jaylen Sebree and Brett Thompson to become the first trio in Golden Eagle history to all shoot above 40 percent from deep in the same season.
"We're very proud of Jayvis," Pelphrey expressed. "He's tremendous with the basketball in his hands. He really was able to exceed expectations from a catch-and-shoot standpoint last season and will get challenged this year from a leadership standpoint."
Wood, the longest-tenured member of the Tech squad, made his first trip to media day to represent the program after delivering one of the more iconic, albeit, agonizing moments in tournament history back in March.
In last season's OVC Tournament Championship contest against Southeast Missouri, Wood missed hitting the biggest shot in program history by less than an inch, burying a fade-away, buzzer-beater after hauling in a pass from the length of the court. Initially thought to be a game-winning triple, further review revealed his foot to still be on the 3-point arc, resulting in a game-tying jumper that forced overtime.
While the Redhawks came away with the victory, Wood capped off a heroic performance with a career-high 24 points, as well as seven rebounds.
"Jayvis, Diante, and Erik [Oliver] will all embrace that leadership challenge," Pelphrey said. "The team voted those three guys as captains. To have your three most experienced players, all seniors, in those roles is imperative. We lost a great leader in Ty Perry, who really changed everything here for us, in terms of a sense of community, belonging, and everyone being all in.
"That's going to be their challenge and we're going to hit them with that. I'm excited for Diante. I've been around him for a long, long time and I'm just so proud of the young man he's becoming and the father that he is. I'm just looking forward to his senior year. Erik had a serious knee injury but is ahead of schedule and we're very thankful for him. He comes with a sense of calm out there and is another guy who can really shoot the basketball and play different roles. I think we've seen Erik grow as a leader since he's been in Cookeville and he's embraced that role. All three of those young men are unique and different as players and as leaders and are going to really complement each other well."
For the 2023-24 season, the Golden Eagles were selected to make their third consecutive trip to Evansville in March, finishing sixth in the league's preseason predicted order of finish, just four points back of Southeast Missouri.
Despite returning just five members to last year's team, Pelphrey and his coaching staff brought in a class of 11 newcomers that helped lift the program to its highest point in over a decade. While it took the squad some time to adapt and adjust to one another, come OVC play, the Golden Eagles got after it.
After back-to-back losses to open league action, Tech flipped the script and rolled off five straight victories, embarking on an 11-7 conference record that saw the purple and gold secure a second-place finish in the regular season standings, the best by the program since 2004-05.
Tech entered the OVC Tournament as the No. 2 seed, its highest since claiming the No. 1 position after winning the league's regular-season crown in 2004-05. It earned them an automatic berth to the semifinals as well, the team's 20th trip to the final four of the OVC's postseason event.
This season, the purple and gold welcome 10 newcomers with seven members of the 2022-23 squad back in Cookeville. Back for the Golden Eagles are Harvey, Wood, Grant Slatten, Grant Strong, Erik Oliver, Bogdan Zimonjic, and Jerome Beya.
"I think it's exciting to put together a team and try to get them to mesh together as quickly as possible," Pelphrey explained. "Last year, we had 11 new guys and this year it will be 10. This is kind of the new norm now really and there are challenges that come with that, especially trying to get your team on the same page in terms of being cohesive, understanding that winning sets the rules, and that everyone has to buy in to those things on a daily basis. You don't get to pick and choose what dictates winning. You get to pick and choose whether you do it or not."
New to the crew for 2023-24 campaign are sophomore guard Brandon Brown (Bristol, Tenn. / Lees-McRae), sophomore guard Nick Choate (Livingston, Tenn. / Livingston Academy), sophomore center David Craig (Johannesburg, South Africa / Mercer), sophomore guard Josiah Davis (Kitchener, Ontario / West Virginia), junior guard David Early (Logan, W.Va. / Marshall), sophomore forward Daniel Egbuniwe (Memphis, Tenn. / Little Rock), junior forward Rodney Johnson Jr. (Bryan, Texas / Weatherford College), freshman guard Kyle Layton (McKinney, Texas / Mountain Brook [AL] HS), freshman forward Rylee Samons (Pikeville, Ky. / Pikeville HS), and junior guard DeSean Woods (Lexington, Ky. / Southern U.).
"This group has been really good," Pelphrey said. "We're excited about the processes we've gone about in putting the team together. I thought that training camp in June and July was effective in trying to create situations where our guys were forced to get to know each other doing things on the court as well as off to develop comradery and relationships.
Fans can get a first glimpse of the 2023-24 Golden Eagles Thursday, Oct. 26 when they host UT Southern in an exhibition contest in the Hooper Eblen Center as part of Purple Palooza. Tech officially kicks off the new campaign on Monday, Nov. 6 with a 5:30 p.m. CT affair at Tennessee.
"It's still a little bit early for me to try and predict what kind of team we're going to be," Pelphrey added. "We're still trying to create that identity. I do think that we'll have a chance to be as good of a defensive team as we've been since our staff has been here, which is exciting to be able to hopefully defend and rebound at a higher level."
Season tickets for Tennessee Tech men's basketball are now on sale. To order, call 931-372-3940, visit the Hooper Eblen Center ticket office or visit TTUSports.com.
2023-24 Preseason All-OVC Men's Basketball Team
F – Keenon Cole, Lindenwood
F – KK Curry, UT Martin
G – Marcus Fitzgerald, Tennessee State
G – Mark Freeman, Morehead State
F – DeAntoni Gordon, Little Rock
G – Jayvis Harvey, Tennessee Tech
G – Kinyon Hodges, Tennessee State
G – Damarco Minor, SIUE
G – Jordan Sears, UT Martin
G – Ray'Sean Taylor, SIUE
G – Drew Thelwell, Morehead State
G – Shamar Wright, SIUE
Preseason Player of the Year: Mark Freeman, Morehead State
2023-24 OVC Men's Basketball Preseason Poll
1. Morehead State (20 first-place votes) – 200 points
2. SIUE – 162
3. Tennessee State (2) – 153
4. UT Martin – 149
5. Southeast Missouri – 124
6. Tennessee Tech – 120
7. Little Rock – 85
8. Western Illinois – 80
9. Southern Indiana – 63
10. Lindenwood – 40
11. Eastern Illinois – 34
Photo by Thomas Corhern
