NAPERVILLE, IL—NJIT senior Isaiah Wilkerson is the Great West Conference Men's Basketball Player of the Week for games played through January 1, the league office announced Monday evening.
 
Wilkerson, who is a two-time all-conference pick, earned his first official GWC Player of the Week honor this season for his work in two games the final week of the 2011 calendar year.
 
In a 66-53 home win over Fairleigh Dickinson on December 28, he scored 21 points, connecting on six of his 12 field goal attempts and 8-for-9 at the foul line. He made his only 3-point attempt of the night. Wilkerson added five rebounds and a steal.
 
Two nights later, in an 84-74 loss at defending Northeast Conference champ Long Island University, Wilkerson scored 13 points and led the Highlanders in rebounds, with seven.
 
For the week, he was 12-23 from the field (.522), including 2-5 on threes, and 8-9 on free throws. He averaged 17 points and 6 rebounds, while also collecting four steals and playing 67 minutes without a turnover.
 
For the season, the senior from Staten Island, NY, leads NJIT in scoring (15.5 ppg), rebounding (5.4 rpg) and steals (23). His 26 assists are second on the team.
 
With 17 points and five rebounds in Monday night's 78-58 win over Lafayette, Wilkerson continued to advance on the NJIT career lists for scoring and for rebounds in the Division I era (since 2006-07).
 
Isaiah has 1,261 career points, moving him into 10th place ahead of  Reggie James, who scored 1,250 points when NJIT was a Division III program from 1985 to 1989. Wilkerson's 474 career rebounds are 18 shy of the school DI record set by 2011 graduate Jheryl Wilson.
 
Wilkerson also received a media award for the week, taking GWC Player of the Week honors from the website CollegeSportsMadness.com.
 
The website, which names Players of the Week in every Division I conference, honored Wilkerson for the third time this season, having previously named him to the same honor on November 14 and December 5.