Oct. 14—Andrew Cook and Alton Hamilton IV made the Big Sky men's basketball preseason all-conference team and the Eastern Washington Eagles were picked third by the media and coaches in the preseason polls released on Wednesday.
The Eagles were the only team to land two players on the seven-man preseason all-conference team. Northern Colorado's Langston Reynolds, who is back with the Bears after playing for Minnesota last season, was named preseason MVP.
While Montana State was picked first and Northern Colorado was picked second in both polls, the Eagles received the second-most first-place votes in the coaches poll with three. The Bobcats got seven such votes. The Idaho Vandals, picked sixth by the coaches and media, received one first-place vote in the coaches poll.
The Bobcats finished second in the 2025-26 regular season Big Sky standings, a game behind Portland State. The Vikings were picked to finish fifth this year by the media, one spot behind Montana; the Vikings and Grizzlies tied for fourth in the coaches poll.
The bottom five spots in the polls are the same, with newcomer Utah Tech sitting in seventh, followed in order by Weber State, Idaho State, Southern Utah and Northern Arizona.
The other players named preseason all-conference are Jed Miller (Montana State), Ethan Potter (Utah Tech), Jaiden Feroah (Southern Utah) and Koren Johnson (Portland State).
This is the second straight season that Cook, now a grad senior, has earned a spot on the preseason all-Big Sky team. However, he missed all of last season with an ankle injury.
Hamilton, now a senior, was named second team all-conference after the 2025-26 season when he led the Eagles in rebounds per game (5.7) and tied for the team lead in steals (27). He also scored 13.5 points per game, second-most on the team.
Eastern finished 11-7 in conference play last year, the third-best record in the league. Idaho finished 9-9 but won the Big Sky Conference Tournament; it received a No. 15 seed in the NCAA Tournament where it lost to No. 2 seed Houston, 78-47, in the first round.
The Eagles open this season at Stanford on Nov. 2. Idaho hosts George Fox in its own opener on the same day.