AWARDS SEASON
Breaking down Big East races for individual honors: Could any Huskies win?
There are only three weeks before Big East men’s basketball teams venture into the ‘World’s Most Famous Arena’ for the conference tournament. In the days leading up to that, a season full of fan debate will culminate with the individual award announcements.
This year, awards will be given out by both the conference and the Associated Press, acknowledging the most valuable player in the conference, the best defender, the rookie of the year and more.
Uconn fans will find out if Adama Sanogo is the Player of the Year as was the preseason prediction. Or if Alex Karaban’s clutch shooting and steadiness in the starting role is enough to edge
Villanova’s projected lottery pick Cam Whitmore for Freshman of the Year. And Defensive Player of the Year, could Andre Jackson win it?
Let’s take a deeper look at the conference award races:
Player of the Year
Among several deserving candidates for Big East Player of the
Year, Marquette’s Tyler Kolek and Xavier’s Souley Boum stand ahead of the pack, though the expansive shadow of 7-foot-1 Ryan Kalkbrenner of Creighton looms over and Providence’s physically dominant guard-forward Bryce Hopkins deserves consideration.
Uncoincidentally, those are arguably the most impactful players on the four best teams in the conference.
Though he is the league’s leading scorer (17.2 ppg) and No. 7 in both rebounding (7.3) and field goal percentage (.582), Sanogo’s case will likely be diminished by the team’s current sixth-place position in the conference standings.
Kolek has proven to be one of the best playmakers in college basketball. His 7.6 assists per game lead the Big East and rank No. 2 in the country, helping Marquette to surprisingly sit at the top of the conference at 13-3. Opposite Sanogo, Kolek has the benefit of leading an overachieving team that was predicted to finish ninth in the preseason coaches’ poll.
Boum transferred to Xavier from UTEP as a graduate student this season and quickly became one of the best transfer portal additions in the country, averaging 16.1 points and 4.9 assists per game, both top-five in the conference. Kalkbrenner is one of the Big East’s most effective players on both ends of the court, shooting a league-high 67% from the field and blocking 2.3 shots per game; he has proven to be extremely valuable to his Creighton team, which struggled in the games he missed earlier in the season. Hopkins is second in the
league in scoring (16.8) and in rebounding (9.2). He has had nine double-doubles this season for the Friars and finished every game but two in double digits in scoring.
Freshman of the Year
Recognized a league-leading five times for the weekly award, Uconn’s Karaban is likely the front-runner with his 9.7 points, 4.2 rebounds and 1.8 assists in 29 minutes per game. Karaban, a forward who has played at least 20 minutes in all but one of the Huskies’ games, doesn’t light the world on fire but has quietly been one of the most consistent players in the league with and without the ball. His closest competition for the Freshman of the Year distinction, however, is Villanova’s Whitmore — the exact opposite.
Whitmore entered college basketball with a ton of hype surrounding him. He was the No. 22 player in his class, No. 1 at the power forward position according to ESPN. The Mcdonald’s All-american was anticipated to be a rare one-and-done out of the conference and was picked as Freshman of the Year in the preseason.
After missing the first seven games of the season following surgery on his thumb, Whitmore quickly made an impact for the struggling Wildcats (13-13, 7-8/Big East) and has averaged 12.4 points, 5.4 rebounds and 1.6 steals per game while shooting 46.6% from the field and 35.4% from 3-point range. He has won the weekly award three times.
Defensive Player of the Year
The 7-foot-1 shot-affecting tower named Kalkbrenner, who won the award last year, is likely to repeat. With his 2.3 blocks per game, Kalkbrenner has been the stalwart in leading Creighton as the league’s best defensive team. Other candidates for the defensive award include Providence guard Devin Carter and Seton Hall’s KC Ndefo; Uconn’s Andre Jackson is always in the conversation.
Jackson is one of three Huskies in the top five of Evanmiya.com’s Defensive Bayesian Performance Rating for the Big East alongside Hassan Diarra and freshman Donovan Clingan. Ndefo has the highest rating, followed by his Seton Hall teammate Kadary Richmond.
Sixth Man of the Year
Uconn fans would love to see the local star Clingan take this award home to Bristol. Xavier’s Jerome Hunter has played his way to increased minutes, however, and is averaging 6.5 points, 3.9 rebounds and 1.2 assists in 17.5 minutes per game. Marquette’s David Joplin is just as strong a candidate for the award, averaging 9.8 points and 3.4 rebounds in 19.1 minutes per game off the bench — in one game this year against Depaul, Joplin scored 28 points on 8-for-11 shooting on 3-pointers.
Clingan, with the lowest minute total of the three, is averaging 7.5 points, 6.1 rebounds and 1.9 blocks per game. He was named the MVP of the Phil Knight Invitational after Uconn won the tournament in November, but has only scored more than five points in one of the last eight games as he plays behind Sanogo.
Coach of the Year
Unless something inconceivable happens, Marquette’s Shaka Smart will take home this award without breaking a sweat. In a year where the Golden Eagles were expected to struggle after losing two top scorers and not hitting the transfer portal or bringing in a highly touted recruit, Smart had Marquette ranked as a Top 10 team in the country.
Marquette ranks in the top two in the conference in almost every offensive statistic, and leads the league with a 5.9 turnover margin — the next best is St. John’s at 1.1.
The only other coach in the conversation would be Xavier’s Sean Miller, who has led the Musketeers to an 11-4 record in league play in his second stint heading the program.