Russell Westbrook Earns NBA's MVP Award
June 26, 2017 | Men's Basketball
Former UCLA guard Russell Westbrook earned the NBA's Most Valuable Player award for the first time in his career, as announced Monday at the year-end NBA Awards Show in New York.
Westbrook, who played at UCLA for two seasons (2006-07 and 2007-08), became the third former UCLA player to capture the league's MVP award. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, known as Lew Alcindor while at UCLA, earned MVP honors six times (1971, 1972, 1974, 1976, 1977, 1980), and Bill Walton was named the league's MVP in 1978.
With Westbrook's award on Monday evening, UCLA has become the first school in the nation to have produced three players who won the NBA's Most Valuable Player Award. In addition to UCLA, LSU (Shaquille O'Neal and Bob Pettit) and North Carolina (Bob McAdoo and Michael Jordan) have each had two former players win the MVP award.
In his ninth NBA season (all with the Oklahoma City Thunder), Westbrook became the league's second player to ever average a triple-double, posting regular-season averages of 31.6 points, 10.7 rebounds and 10.4 assists per game.
Westbrook's remarkable feat had previously been accomplished by Oscar Robertson during the 1961-62 season. Since that NBA campaign 55 years ago, several players have come close to averaging a triple-double but have finished short.
Westbrook led the league in scoring (31.6 ppg), ranked third in the NBA in assists per game (10.4) and was 10th overall in rebounding (10.7).
Westbrook set the NBA's single-season record for most triple-doubles (42), one ahead of Robertson's mark of 41 triple-doubles during the 1961-62 season. He helped the Oklahoma City Thunder post a 47-35 regular-season record as the No. 6 seed in the Western Conference.
During two seasons at UCLA, Westbrook played in 75 games (35 starts), averaging 8.3 points, 2.4 rebounds and 2.5 assists per game. He registered 12.7 points and 4.3 assists per game as a sophomore in 2007-08. The Bruins advanced to the Final Four in each of Westbrook's two seasons at UCLA.
In addition, former UCLA player Bob Myers was named the NBA's Executive of the Year. Myers, who played for the Bruins from 1994-97, has been general manager for the Golden State Warriors since April 2012. The Warriors have won the NBA Finals in two of the last three seasons (including in 2017).