2003 Top 50 List: Not eligible
Dan Collins List: Yes
I struggled with whether to put Tyler Zeller on the list. What he has going for him is an outstanding senior year in 2012 in which he ran away with ACC Player of the Year and was an All-American, finishing eighth in the AP voting and making second team on all the major listings. He was nearly as good as a junior in 2011, and with all due respect to Reggie Jackson of Boston College, probably should have made first team All-ACC. Both the 2011 and 2012 Carolina teams were Top 10 teams, and Zeller was their best player.
What he doesn’t have going for him is that the ACC in 2012 was pretty weak. Kenpom has them as the fifth-best conference that year, after the Big Ten, Big 12, Big East, and the SEC. Zeller’s main competition for ACC Player of the Year was Virginia’s Mike Scott, a nice player but unlikely to be confused with Ralph Sampson. I didn’t put Zeller or Kyle Guy on my early versions of this list, but after some reflection, I decided that I was probably being too hard on players from the 2010s. Zeller is deserving.
The old cliché is that the elite programs don’t rebuild, they just reload, and that was certainly true of Roy Williams’ program at Carolina. But reloading isn’t always as easy as it sounds; consider the 2010 Tar Heels. The core four from the 2009 national championship team all departed, with Tyler Hansbrough and Danny Green graduating and Wayne Ellington and Ty Lawson leaving for the NBA. The 2010 team was really starting over, with a combination of upperclassmen who had previously been role players and highly touted recruits who were unproven at the college level. The result was a mess. The upperclassmen – Deon Thompson, Will Graves, and Marcus Ginyard – just weren’t that good. And the young players played like young players; nobody came in and made an immediate impact. Roy kept changing the rotations, trying different combinations, desperate for something to work, but nothing ever did. Zeller showed some promise early, but he got hurt and missed most of the ACC schedule. The offseason was filled with more churn, as Ed Davis turned pro, Travis and David Wear transferred, and Graves left the program.
So there were lots of questions going into 2011, and the early season returns weren’t promising as the Tar Heels lost non-conference matchups to Minnesota, Vanderbilt, Illinois, and Texas. After a dismal loss to Georgia Tech in mid-January, it seemed like they were on their way to another disappointing season. But Roy finally found the right buttons to push, and the Heels reeled off 12 of 13, culminating with a blowout win at Duke in the regular season finale. The core group was built around Zeller, surrounding him with Kendall Marshall, John Henson, Harrison Barnes, and Reggie Bullock.
Amazingly, all five of them returned in 2012, and UNC was preseason #1. They didn’t quite live up to that billing, but they had an outstanding year, going 14-2 in the ACC and advancing to the regional final. Injuries really hurt that team; Tar Heel fans will remember, not without pain, that Roy played Stilman White in the regionals after Marshall broke a bone in his wrist, that on top of a season-ending injury to Dexter Strickland earlier in the year. Had they stayed healthy, they had a great chance to make the Final Four.
So give Zeller some credit for that as well. He had to deal with some real adversity in the program, and he led them back to the top, or very near it.
This name surprised me a little, but he probably belongs here. But the main thing I remember about Zeller is that I thought Mike Scott should have been POY instead.
I don’t know if he should be there. I have a list of 20-25 guys who didn’t make the list but have a decent case to get one of these last few spots. At some point I’ll do a post on them or create an honorable mention list or something.
As for Mike Scott, I think we know why you liked him. If his name had been Jose Cruz, you’d be pushing him for national player of the year.