UNC's RJ Davis wins Jerry West Award

North Carolina’s senior RJ Davis is the winner of the 2024 Jerry West Award, presented by the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame to the top shooting guard in the country.

The shooting guard award is named for 14-time NBA All-Star Jerry West, who was a Final Four Most Outstanding Player, Olympic gold medalist, NBA Finals Most Valuable Player and NBA champion. West was honored on Friday with his third election to the Hall of Fame, this time as a contributor.

Davis is the first Tar Heel and second ACC player to win the West Award (Duke's RJ Barrett in 2019). Three Tar Heels (Raymond Felton in 2005, Ty Lawson in 2009 and Kendall Marshall in 2012) previously won the Hall of Fame’s point guard award.

This season, Davis was a consensus/unanimous first-team All-America, the ACC Player of the Year, a finalist for national player-of-the-year honors, four-time national player of the week and four-time ACC Player of the Week.

The White Plains, N.Y., native scored 784 points, the fourth most in a season by a Tar Heel, the most since Tyler Hansbrough's 882 in 2007-08 and the most ever by a UNC guard.

Additionally, Davis:

• led the ACC in scoring in all games (career-high 21.2) and conference play (21.1).

• set the UNC single-season record with 113 threes (previous 105 by Justin Jackson in 2016-17) and 3.05 threes per game (previous 2.71 by Shammond Williams in 1996-97).

• made the ninth-most threes in a season in ACC history.

• made a three in 36 of 37 games, including multiple threes 32 times.

• made a career-high seven threes vs. Miami on Feb. 26, when he set the all-time Smith Center record with 42 points.

• made 41 straight free throws from Nov. 23-Dec. 16, which tied the UNC record.

• led (or co-led) UNC in scoring 26 times and led (or co-led) both teams 18 times.

• had nine games with at least 20 points and five assists, most by a Tar Heel since Kenny Smith had nine in 1986-87.

• scored a career-high 42 points, scored 30 or more points four times, 25 or more points 11 times and 20 or more points 23 times.

• was the first Tar Heel to score 20 or more in eight straight games since 2008-09.

• was the first Tar Heel since Charlie Scott in 1970 and only the fourth ever to score 26 or more points in five straight games (30 vs. Arkansas, 27 vs. Tennessee, 27 vs. FSU, 26 vs. UConn and 27 vs. Kentucky).

Davis is Carolina’s all-time leader in free throw percentage (.858), is second in three-pointers (274) and fifth in scoring (2,088 points). Phil Ford is the only Tar Heel guard with more points.