2003 Top 50 List: Yes
Dan Collins List: Yes
Burleson and McMillen, along with #58 Len Elmore and #57 Bobby Jones, are part of the quartet of outstanding big men in the class of 1974. You can view the post on Elmore and Jones here. After looking at this for a long time, all I can really conclude is that Burleson and McMillen are a notch ahead of Elmore and Jones. But each of those pairs is dead even. It’s impossible to differentiate conclusively.
Looking at All-ACC voting, Burleson had 579 career points; McMillen had 570.
Looking at All-America voting, that was summarized in the Elmore/Jones post. I suppose, if you look hard enough, you might say that McMillen’s record there was ever so slightly better, but that requires some serious hair-splitting.
I decided to look at head-to-head. I don’t think that’s a very good way of differentiating players, but I’m grasping at straws here. They did play head-to-head eight times in their three years, twice in ACC Tournament finals, so there is quite a lot to go on. Here are the results:
| Date | McMillen – FG | Pts | Reb | Burleson – FG | Pts | Reb | Game Winner |
| 1/5/1972 | 8-14 | 22 | 7 | 7-11 | 18 | 8 | MD |
| 1/31/1972 | 8-20 | 22 | 4 | 6-10 | 18 | 13 | MD |
| 1/14/1973 | 12-22 | 29 | 14 | 9-17 | 20 | 15 | NCS |
| 1/31/1973 | 10-16 | 25 | 6 | 8-15 | 18 | 10 | NCS |
| 3/10/1973 | 12-20 | 24 | 8 | 7-13 | 14 | 14 | NCS |
| 1/13/1974 | 9-18 | 24 | 11 | 3-19 | 13 | 10 | NCS |
| 1/30/1974 | 14-23 | 28 | 14 | 5-13 | 11 | 13 | NCS |
| 3/9/1974 | 11-16 | 22 | 7 | 18-25 | 38 | 13 | NCS |
On average, I think you’d have to say that McMillen got the better of those matchups. But, in the most important game of them all, the 1974 ACC Tournament final, Burleson played one of the great games of all time in leading the Wolfpack to victory in the “greatest game ever played”. So call that one even.
In terms of career numbers, as of the time they graduated, McMillen was 9th in career scoring, Burleson 18th; Burleson was 6th in career rebounds, McMillen 14th. Call that one even.
These guys are about as even as two players can get. But I have to put someone ahead, and I’m going to go with Burleson. Ultimately, he was Most Outstanding Player of the ACC Tournament twice, and McMillen wasn’t. That’s a fact. As you can see above, that’s certainly not because McMillen didn’t play well; in fact, he was first team All-Tournament all three years that he played. It’s simply because Burleson’s team won. Obviously David Thompson had a lot to do with that, but McMillen’s supporting cast was pretty good too.
McMillen, Jones, and Burleson were all members of the 1972 Olympic team which lost the gold medal game to the Soviet Union in such a controversial manner. Burleson was benched for that game for breaking a team rule – a decision that Burleson still seethes about to this day.
In Tim Peeler’s Legends of NC State Basketball, Burleson comes across as a complex figure. At times, he was plagued with self-doubt. Coming out of high school, he didn’t think he was good enough to play for Duke or North Carolina. But his fierce competitiveness eventually overshadowed his timidity and self-doubt and drove him to be great. He was known as a big game player, and his record bears that out.
One final comment on the Burleson/McMillen/Jones/Elmore group. I think you would be hard pressed to find a similar quartet of four players in college basketball history – players of this quality, who played the same years, in the same conference, at (roughly) the same position. I can’t think of one.