Denmon, Dixon top list of Big 12 honors for Missouri

Missouri's Marcus Denmon earned All-Big 12 First Team honors for the second time in his career.
Missouri's Marcus Denmon earned All-Big 12 First Team honors for the second time in his career.

COLUMBIA, Mo. - Five players from the Missouri men's basketball team were honored with 2012 All-Big 12 awards announced Sunday.

Senior Marcus Denmon was named to the All-Big 12 first team for the second straight year, junior Michael Dixon was a unanimous selection as the Sixth Man of the Year and also earned a spot on the All-Defensive Team, senior Ricardo Ratliffe was name to the second team and senior Kim English and sophomore Phil Pressey made the third team.

Denmon leads the Tigers and comes in second in the conference in scoring at 18 points per game. He ranks sixth on the all-time Missouri scoring list with 1,714 points, first all-time in games played (tied with English with 137) and second in 3-pointers (274). Denmon ranks second in the league in free-throw percentage (88.8) and 3-pointers made (2.94), third in steals (1.55), seventh in 3-point field goal percentage (41.9) and grabs 5.1 rebounds a contest. Denmon joins Kareem Rush as the only Tigers named to the All-Big 12 first team twice.

Dixon is the second Tiger to claim Sixth Man of the Year honors, joining Matt Lawrence, who won the award in 2009. Dixon ranks fourth on the team with 13.3 ppg, a number that ranks first nationally among sixth-men. He also dishes out 3.1 assists and records 1.2 steals per outing. Dixon leads the Big 12 by shooting 89.5 percent from the free-throw line.

Ratliffe earned his spot on the second team after averaging 13.8 ppg and 7.5 rebounds per game while shooting 70.8 percent from the field. He ranks first in the Big 12 in field goal percentage and will likely break the Missouri record for single-season field goal percentage, a mark he set last year at 63.8 percent. Ratliffe is tops in the conference in offensive rebounds (3.1 per game), fourth in rebounds and 10th in scoring.

English earned his second third-team honor as a Tiger, the other coming during the 2009-10 campaign. He is second on the team with 14.1 ppg while shooting a career-high 50 percent from the field and 45.3 percent from beyond the arc. English's mark from the 3-point line is good for second in the conference and he ranks 13th all-time at Missouri in scoring (1,499).

Pressey sets the standard for point guards in the Big 12, leading the league in both assists (6.1) and steals (2.1) while ranking second in assist-to-turnover ration (2.45). He also chips in with 9.6 ppg and 3.3 rebounds a contest. Pressey owns the school record for assists in a single season with 91 and is only 24 assists away from entering the top 10 on the career list, all while having played only two seasons.

Missouri plays at 6 p.m. Thursday in the Big 12 Tournament quarterfinals in Kansas City against the winner of the Oklahoma State-Texas Tech game.