2003 Top 50 List: Not Eligible
Dan Collins List: Not Eligible
Kyle Guy, as much as anyone on this list, is here because of his postseason accomplishments. His regular season accomplishments and accolades alone wouldn’t be good enough. He did make first team All-ACC twice, but both times he was the 5th-leading vote getter and finished behind a number of other guys who won’t sniff this list. But, he was Most Outstanding Player of both the ACC Tournament (in 2018) and the NCAA Tournament (in 2019). Only six ACC players have won both those honors: Art Heyman, James Worthy, Christian Laettner, Shane Battier, Kyle Singler – and Kyle Guy. I still thought hard about whether he should be here, and I’m not totally convinced. I’m not sure he deserved the MOP from the 2019 tournament; he had some poor games along the way. But he was money in the final. Ultimately, I think it’s enough.
It’s probably a good time also to talk about the decade of the 2010s in ACC basketball. I mentioned in the introduction that there would be less representation from that decade on the list. Let me elaborate on why. There are three reasons, which I will list in order of importance:
- The best players do not stay long enough to build up career accomplishments that are comparable to players from earlier eras.
- The overall level of college basketball is down because so many of the best 19, 20, and 21 year-olds are in the NBA.
- The quality of play in the ACC relative to other conferences has slipped in the 2010s.
Number 1 is self-evident to anyone who is paying attention. Players leaving early is not a new phenomenon, but the 2010s are really when the one-and-done or two-and-done became so prevalent. Here are some of the players who could have accomplished, well, who knows what, had they stayed:
2011: Kyrie Irving (Fr.)
2012: Austin Rivers (Fr.), Harrison Barnes (So.)
2014: Jabari Parker (Fr.), T.J. Warren (So.), Tyler Ennis (Fr.), Rodney Hood (So.)
2015: Jahlil Okafor (Fr.), Terry Rozier (So.), Justise Winslow (Fr.), Tyus Jones (Fr.)
2016: Brandon Ingram (Fr.), Malik Beasley (Fr.)
2017: Luke Kennard (So.), John Collins (So.), Donovan Mitchell (So.), Dennis Smith (Fr.), Jayson Tatum (Fr.), Jonathan Isaac (Fr.), Dwayne Bacon (So.)
2018: Marvin Bagley (Fr.), Wendell Carter (Fr.), Josh Okogie (So.)
2019: Zion Williamson (Fr.), RJ Barrett (Fr.), De’Andre Hunter (So.), Coby White (Fr.)
2020: Vernon Carey (Fr.), Tre Jones (So.), Cole Anthony (Fr.)
2021: Matthew Hurt (So.), Justin Champagnie (So.), Scottie Barnes (Fr.), DJ Steward (Fr.), Day’Ron Sharpe (Fr.)
I am not the first person to make this observation, but this is really hurting college basketball. The primary cause of the situation is clear – the NBA’s 2006 imposition of the 19-year old minimum for draft eligibility. This rule, I would argue, is the worst possible one from the perspective of how it affects college basketball. It would be better for college basketball to have one-and-done players skip college entirely, because it would create more program continuity. Major college basketball programs have a roster identity crisis. I’d be willing to give up the occasional Zion Williamson to have college basketball get back to some sense of continuity.
Of course, the NBA is looking out for its own interests, not the interests of college basketball, and not necessarily the interests of individual players. In order to solve the problem, there has to be an alignment of interests among the different parties. I’m not particularly hopeful that such an alignment is going to happen. But it’s immensely frustrating, because there are obvious solutions to the problem.
I’ve always felt that baseball has it right. Their rule is very simple. If you want to turn pro out of high school, go right ahead. If you choose to enter a four-year college, then you’re not eligible for the draft until you turn 21 or complete your junior year. It’s good for the players, who have the freedom to turn pro out of high school if they want. It’s good for the college programs because players have to stay for three years, so you get the continuity.
I’m not an expert on the business of basketball and NBA collective bargaining, so I don’t know how likely it is that solutions are on the horizon. There has been some serious talk about the abolition of the 19-year old minimum. This would drive some of the one-and-done players straight to the NBA, but it’s hard to know how many.
Duke has clearly built their entire recruiting approach around the one-and-done rule. It will be interesting to see if Jon Scheyer continues that approach.
The second point is a different effect of the same cause. It is that the overall level of competition in college basketball must be down in comparison with prior eras, for the simple reason that the best players of that age group are in the NBA. As a result, we have to adjust our evaluation of modern college basketball players in comparison to players from earlier eras.
I’ve previously done a detailed study on this effect by creating hypothetical All-America teams based on a fictional scenario where every player goes to college and stays for four years. But if you want a quick example, consider Tyler Hansbrough. Hansbrough was a Consensus 2nd Team All-American in his freshman season in 2006, which is very impressive. However, let’s note the following players who were college age that year but were already playing in the NBA: Carmelo Anthony, Andrew Bogut, Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Charlie Villanueva, Raymond Felton, Luol Deng, Dwight Howard, Andre Iguodala, Al Jefferson, Josh Smith, Chris Bosh, and LeBron James. Now – is anyone prepared to maintain, in the face of that list, that Tyler Hansbrough would have been an All-American, if even half of those players had been in college?
The third point is that, aside from all the effects of early departures and one-and-done, the ACC has slipped relative to other conferences. There are several ways to look at this – kenpom conference rankings, conference RPIs, sports-reference.com Simple Ratings System – but however you look at it, the Big 10 and Big 12 were better than the ACC in the 2010s.
So, without giving too much away, don’t expect to see a lot of players from the 2010s on the list. But Kyle Guy did just enough to make the cut.