The college basketball season has eclipsed its halfway point, as conference play is well underway and conference pecking order is starting to be established. To celebrate the mid-point in the season, our Rob Cassidy doles out some mid-season superlatives to players and teams around the sport.
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PLAYER OF THE YEAR: Zach Edey
Most tabbed Zach Edey as the favorite to win Player of The Year prior to the season and, halfway through the year, here the Purdue big man stands – the heavy favorite to take home such honors. Edey opened the season at or around +155 to win the Naismith Trophy, and has improved those odds steadily during a season that has seen him average 23 points and 11 rebounds per contest while leading the No. 2 team in the country. There’s no such thing as a player-of-the-year lock on Jan. 30, but Edey is certainly trending in that direction.
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BIGGEST SURPRISE TEAM: South Carolina
Cases could be made for Utah State, Butler, Oklahoma and a handful of other programs, but the 17-3 Gamecocks have shattered even the most optimistic of expectations. The preseason saw South Carolina coming off a 11-21 record and picked to once again finish last in the SEC. Things, of course, have not gone according to that plan, though, as second-year head coach Lamont Paris has his team on the doorstep of the national rankings with wins over Kentucky, Missouri and Arkansas to his name.
The season has been a far cry from last year, which featured some absolutely particularly low valleys. These days, Paris feels like one of the early front-runners to win SEC Coach of the Year, as he’s starting to look like a solid bet to will the Gamecocks to their first NCAA tournament berth since 2017 and second appearance since 2004.
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BIGGEST SURPRISE PLAYER: Dalton Knecht
Knecht was seen as a nice piece when he transferred from Northern Colorado to Tennessee in the offseason, but nobody outside of Knoxville saw him immediately becoming one of the best players in college basketball.
As a junior, the 6-foot-6 Knecht polished off his season by being named second-team All-Big Sky as a senior he seems like he may be on a collision course with All-American honors, as the senior is averaging nearly 20 points per game and has transferred from complimentary piece to full-blown star in just a few months in the SEC.
He has scored 25 points or more in each of his last five games and is the biggest reason for the Vols’ 15-4 start and top-five ranking.
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MOST DISAPPOINTING TEAM: UCLA
The Bruins were picked to finish third in the Pac-12 by the league's coaches prior to the season and that prophecy seems unlikely to be fulfilled to say the very least. Instead, UCLA is 4-5 in conference play and boasts a 9-11 overall record.
The rough start has caused head coach Mick Cronin to lose his cool both on the court and in the press conference room at times. It’s going to take quite a turnaround if the Bruins hope to avoid missing the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2019, a fact that would have stunned anyone had you told them prior to the season.
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HOTTEST SEAT: Kenny Payne
There’s not much to say about the Kenny Payne era that hasn’t already been said, and there’s no need to pile on the Cardinals' head coach or his 10-42 record at the program. The plunge feels like it's reaching its end, however, as buzz about Payne’s removal has been building for weeks.
Louisville has already eclipsed his win total from last year, but the team’s 6-14 record isn’t enough to impress anyone, let alone call off the dogs that desperately want to make a change before next season. Barring something unforeseen, logic dictates the Cardinals will be in the market for a new head coach come March.
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POSSIBLE MARCH DARKHORSE: Grand Canyon
The criteria here is a team that sits outside the current AP Top 25 but looks capable of making a run in the NCAA tournament, and that makes the Antelopes intriguing to say the least. Head coach Bryce Drew has his team sitting at 19-2 and projected to make back-to-back tournament appearances for the first time in school history. Guards Tyon Grant-Foster and Rayshon Harrison are both upperclassmen and comprise an experienced and talented backcourt capable of taking over games against high-level competition.
And while Grand Canyon isn’t very battle-tested, it pushed likely tournament team South Carolina to the limit in an early-season contest and has the pieces and confidence to start clicking at the right time come March. Should things continue on their current trajectory, GCU should enter the tournament seeded a bit higher than it did a year ago, when it sat on the 14 line. The Antelopes smell like the possible 12 in a 12-over-5 upset.
