10/23/2025 7:30:00 AM | Men's Basketball, Paul Coro
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Moore also named conference's Preseason Player of the Year
By: Paul Coro
Now in a conference that has put four or more teams in the NCAA Tournament for four consecutive seasons, Grand Canyon received a promising prognostication Thursday when the Mountain West Preseason Poll picked GCU to finish fourth in its inaugural MW season. Jaden Henley
Part of what put the Lopes in the upper third of the nation's sixth-best conference was the media voters' respect for the GCU backcourt of senior Jaden Henley and graduate Brian Moore Jr., both of whom were chosen for the 10-player Preseason All-Mountain West Team.
Mountain West voters are familiar with Henley's game after he started last season for UNLV, but they also took note of Moore's past season at Norfolk State to name him the MW Preseason Newcomer of the Year.
San Diego State received all 26 first-place votes and put a conference-best three players on the Preseason All-Mountain West Team, including Preseason Player of the Year Miles Byrd Jr. Byrd, a 6-foot-6 junior guard, returns to the Aztecs after averaging 12.3 points, 4.4 rebounds, 2.7 assists and 2.1 steals last season to earn a spot on All-Mountain West second team. Brian Moore Jr.
Only San Diego State and GCU claimed multiple spots on the Preseason All-Mountain West Team, accounting for half of the team.
Utah State and Boise State claimed the second and third spots, respectively, in the preseason poll. GCU finished ahead of the defending regular-season champion, New Mexico (fifth), and the 2025 Mountain West Championship winner, Colorado State (seventh-place tie with Nevada). UNLV was sixth.
Last season, Boise State earned all but one first-place vote in the MW preseason poll but finished in a tie for fourth place and did not reach the NCAA Tournament. Conference champ New Mexico had been tabbed second while the MW's other NCAA qualifiers were rated fourth (San Diego State), sixth (Utah State) and seventh (Colorado State).
The Mountain West sent four teams to NCAAs in 2022, 2023 and 2025 and six in 2024.
Moore earned notoriety last season as the winner of the Lou Henson Award for the nation's top mid-major player. The 6-foot-2 guard averaged 18.1 points, 3.7 rebounds and 3.0 assists with 54.5% shooting from the field and 39.4% from 3-point range on Norfolk State, the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference regular-season and postseason champion.
Henley, at 6 feet 7, is taking on a full-time point guard role this season for the first time after finishing last season strongly when he ran the offense for injury-riddled UNLV. He finished the season with career-high averages in points (12.5), rebounds (4.2), assists (1.8) and steals (1.6) while making a career-best 86.4% of his free throws.
In his final six games last season, Henley averaged 17.8 points, 5.0 rebounds, 3.5 assists and 2.3 steals.
GCU head coach Bryce Drew, graduate power forward Nana Owusu-Anene and Henley are participating in Mountain West Basketball Media Day on Thursday in Las Vegas. The Lopes will play a home exhibition game against USC on Saturday before opening the season Nov. 3 against Purdue Fort Wayne at Global Credit Union Arena.
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