Oscar Tshiebwe was Kentucky Sports Figure of the Year but for the first time, females had more first-place votes than males

WNBA Rookie of the Year Rhyne Howard came back to watch UK play last week. (Vicky Graff Photo)

Oscar Tshiebwe’s historic 2021-22 season where he led the nation in rebounding — his 515 rebounds were the third most in one season at UK behind Bill Spivey (567 in 1951) and Cliff Hagan (528 in 1952) — resulted in the UK senior being named the 2022 Lexington Herald-Leader Kentucky Sports Figure of the Year.

He became the first UK men’s basketball player to finish in the top five of the voting since Tyler Ulis was second in 2016 and was the first UK basketball player to win the award since Anthony Davis in 2012.

Second in the voting went to former UK sprinter Abby Steiner and third was UK women’s basketball standout Rhyne Howard.

“It was the first time the top three finishers were active UK athletes in the year the voting took place,” said Herald-Leader columnist Mark Story, who compiles the nomination list and counts the votes.

Steiner finished her UK career as the collegiate record-holder in three individual events — the indoor 200 meters (22.09 seconds), the outdoor 200 meters (21.8) and the indoor 300 meters (35.8). She also won two relay gold medals at the World Championship, the 200 title at the USA Championships and four NCAA events. She was also the SEC Scholar-Athlete of the Year.

Her second-place finish was the highest for an active UK track and field athlete.

Kentucky women’s basketball player Rhyne Howard, a three-time All-American and the second highest scoring female player at UK, was third. She was also the first pick in the WNBA Draft and the 2022 WNBA Rookie of the Year.

She was ninth in the voting in 2019 and second in 2020, She became the first UK basketball player — women’s or men’s — to  have three top-10 finishes.

“This was the first year there were more first-place votes for females than males,” Story said. “I actually thought any of the top three would have been very worthy winners. I actually voted Abby Steiner No. 1 and a lot of other people did, too.”

Steiner did not receive nearly as many votes in western Kentucky and Louisville as she did in the Lexington area and eastern Kentucky.

“I really enjoy counting the votes and reading the comments from voters. Sometimes votes do not alway make sense to me but then I remember things might look differently depending on where you are at,” Story said. “But we had 143 voters this year and hopefully we create some excitement and buzz across the state with this to where even being in the top 10 is considered an honor.”