Sporting News NAIA Basketball Preview

KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Park senior forward Jon Meriweather has been selected as a first-team All-American by The Sporting News, announced earlier this month in the publication’s annual college basketball preseason yearbook.

Meriweather, a 6-foot-8 senior from Kansas City, Mo., is entering his third season with the Pirates after averaging 20.3 points and 9.9 rebounds per game in 2007-08. He helped the Pirates to the Independent Region Semifinal last March on the way to earning three All-America distinctions, marking the first time in Park basketball history that a player was named to three postseason All-America teams.

He also became the first player since 2005 to earn multiple NAIA Division I Player of the Week distinctions during the regular season, earning his first national weekly award in January with the second coming a month later in the season’s final weeks.

A second-team NAIA All-American as selected by the NAIA’s basketball coaches, Meriweather was also a third-team honoree by Victory Sports Network and by Basketball Times.

Entering his senior season, Meriweather has scored 701 career points as a Pirate, an average of 14.0 per game, while his 356 career rebounds average to 7.1 per contest. He also has 90 career blocked shots, including 43 during the final 15 games of the 2007-08 regular season, and at the foul line, Meriweather is an 80.4-percent free throw shooter, making 176-of-219 including 135-of-169 attempts last season.

From the field, Meriweather 262-of-449 in his career (58.4-percent).

Park University will unofficially welcome the 2008-09 season Saturday in Parkville, taking on Livin’ The Dream in an exhibition contest at 3 p.m. inside Breckon Sports Center. The regular season gets underway Nov. 1 at Oklahoma Christian, with the Pirates’ first regular-season home game coming Nov. 4 at 7 p.m. against Benedictine.