By Henry Rawn

March 10, 2025

CINCINNATI — Cincinnati men’s basketball sophomore Jizzle James was named to the All-Big 12 Honorable Mention team, as voted on by the league’s coaches.

He is the third-such honoree for UC the past two years, joining Dan Skillings and Aziz Bandaogo. John Newman III made the All-Defensive team in 2023-24 as well.

James is UC’s leading scorer, including a team-high 13.4 ppg in league play, and is one of three to have started every game this season. He has 725 points in his two years, trailing only eventual NBA players Jacob Evans (765) and Sean Kilpatrick (867) for most points through a freshman and sophomore season at UC dating back to 2010.

The Orlando native was the catalyst behind Cincinnati’s rebirth in the second half of league play. It first began with 15 points in a 93-83 win at UCF, and then he scored 24, 25 and 25 in two wins over BYU and Utah, followed by a hard-fought decision at No. 10 Iowa State. That three-peat feat of consecutive 24-point games marked the first by a Bearcat since Deonta Vaughn the 2007-08 season. He went 6-for-8 from deep against BYU as well.

James also has 11 games of five or more assists and ranks fifth in the Big 12 for assist-turnover ratio.

FORMER UTAH HEAD COACH CRAIG SMITH ON JIZZLE JAMES
“We recruited him some out of high school, and it became clear we weren’t getting him. He’s a dynamic player, strong guy with good size and is very athletic. He’d been struggling shooting coming into our game two weeks ago, and the first shot he makes is a corner three. I think he made three of those in the first half. I don’t remember the WVU or UCF ones, but he had six against BYU. He’s just a hard guy with a really elite pull-up jumper. He and Day Day Thomas both have that…(Cincinnati) was struggling a couple of weeks ago, but that’s certainly changed. He’s good. We didn’t have a lot of answers for him, and it started right from the jump. When we got here for shootaround at 10 a.m., he was in a full lather after a morning workout.”

COURTESY UC SPORTS COMMUNICATIONS