McNeill, McNeal and Joyner Collect AAC Honors

IRVING, Texas – Kim McNeill has been named the American Athletic Conference's Coach of the Year; Danae McNeal has been named Defensive Player of the Year and Most Improved Player; and Amiya Joyner has been named Freshman of the Year as voted on by the league's coaches, the conference announced Sunday.

McNeill's Coach of the Year honor comes on the heels of one of the most remarkable turnarounds in the country this season. After an 11-18 campaign a season ago, McNeill has guided the Pirates to a 20-9 record so far this season, including 11-5 in AAC play. The team defied expectations with their third-place finish in the conference after a 10^th-place run a year ago.

In the AAC preseason poll, ECU was picked dead last, receiving only 19 points in the vote – 13 behind 10^th and a full 80 behind first-place South Florida. The Pirates battled all season and have been rewarded with a bye in the upcoming AAC Tournament as they look to build on their resume and make a push to once more surprise detractors.

McNeill becomes the first ECU coach to win the award since Heather Macy did so in Conference USA in 2013 – also the last time the Pirates were a top-three seed in a conference tournament.

Coming off of an injury hampered 2021-22 season, Danae McNeal bounced back with a vengeance. The senior guard improved from 8.4 to 18.2 points per game and went from 24 steals to 87, 13 assists to 44, 38 rebounds to 88 and boosted her foul shooting from 62.5 percent to 84.4 percent. The Swansea, S.C. native earned three AAC Player of the Week nods and five Honor Roll recognitions throughout the season as she led the conference in both scoring and steals.

For her dramatic improvement, McNeal garnered First-Team All-Conference honors to go with her Most Improved Player award.

McNeal was also far and away the most dominant guard in the league defensively on the season, causing havoc and stealing the ball 87 times while creating many more opportunities to force turnovers with her constant presence. She finished the season with 13 more steals than any other player in the conference to go with her 13 blocks making her a clear choice for the Defensive Player of the Year.

McNeal makes it two Most Improved awards in a row for ECU as Taniyah Thompson took the award home a year ago and is the first Pirate to win Defensive Player of the Year since Lashonda Monk won the award in back-to-back seasons in 2020 and 2021.

It was the local phenom Joyner who seemed destined to run away with the Freshman of the Year award. The Farmville native got better as she went and after not registering a single double-double until Dec. 19 against North Carolina A&T, she finished the season with an ECU freshman-record 13 – including running off a program record seven in a row. The forward also shattered the program's freshman rebounding record with her 249 rebounds – the previous record was set by Marcia Girven 45 years ago at 205. Joyner also put up the fourth most points (293) and tied the third most blocks (41) by a freshman in program history.

En route to those gaudy numbers, Joyner equaled the AAC record with eight Freshman of the Week honors, all coming since Dec. 26, and four consecutive coming in the last four weeks of regular season competition for the Pirates.

In addition to her Freshman of the Year accolade, Joyner collected Third-Team All-Conference and All-Freshman recognitions as well. She is just the second Pirate ever to win Freshman of the Year following Jasmine Young in 2006.

The Pirates open the AAC Tournament on Tuesday at 9 p.m. EST as they take on the winner of the game between Cincinnati and Tulane.

Players Mentioned

Amiya Joyner

Danae McNeal

Taniyah Thompson

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