Larry Nance, Jr. Selected As Pre-Season Conference Player Of The Year

University of Wyoming senior Larry Nance, Jr. has been chosen as the pre-season Mountain West Player of the Year for the upcoming men's basketball season.

The conference released it's pre-season media poll and all-conference team today.

Nance, Jr. was a First-team All-MW selection in 2013-14 despite suffering a season-ending knee injury that forced him to miss the final five conference games. At the time of his injury, he led the team and ranked among league leaders in MW-only games in points (14.5), rebounds (7.8), defensive rebounds (6.5), field goal percentage (50.4), steals (1.7), blocks (2.8) and minutes played (37.9). He scored in double figures in 11 of his 13 conference games last season with two 20-point efforts and three double-doubles.

Nance becomes the first Cowboy on a pre-season all-conference team since Brandon Ewing in 2008-2009. He's also the first Cowboy tabbed as a conference pre-season player of the year since Ewing in 2007-2008.

Nance is joined on the pre-season all-conference squad by Boise State's Anthony Drmic, Colorado State's Daniel Bejarano and San Diego State's Winston Shepard and Dwayne Polee II.

As a team, the Wyoming Cowboys have been picked to finish sixth in the MW in 2014-15 season.

Defending regular season champion San Diego State was selected as the pre-season favorite to win the Mountain West regular season title again. They garnered 34 of the 35 first place votes.

The Aztecs are followed by Boise State, New Mexico, UNLV and Colorado State.

You can find the complete MW Men's Basketball pre-season poll by clicking here. More information on the all-conference team is available here.