This week in the Respect the Hustle Podcast, college basketball analyst takes the show to a new level–one full hour of hot takes, sarcastic praise, and expert analysis on the world of college basketball. First, he deals with this year’s freshmen class and how they’ve been quite underwhelming. Then, he moves on to throwing some respect the way of CBB’s surprise players and coaches.
Not the Year of the Freshman
One year after the likes of Karl-Anthony Towns, Jahlil Okafor, and D’Angelo Russell spoiled our college basketball viewing habits, 2015-2016 has felt like a bit of a let down when it comes to spectacular freshman.
Sure, we have Ben Simmons putting up stupid ridiculous numbers at LSU, but then you have two of the top five ranked freshman barely finding ways to be effective. Whelan knows this, so he takes his time breaking down the struggles that some of the top ranked freshmen have gone through and whether or not they’ll stick around in college to fix them…or if they’ll even be able to fix them.
Before he’s done with the young guns, he ranks his top ten freshmen in the country and some of the names might surprise you. Who will end up with the honor of Freshman of the Year in college basketball?
Surprise, Surprise
Every year, players emerge from the hidden depths of CBB benches or transfer lists or wherever it may be to take the nation by storm. Whelan goes over some of his most surprising breakout performances thus far this year, starting in the Pacific Northwest.
It’s not every day that a team’s backcourt loses a former five-star guard and it looks more like addition by subtraction than anything. But that’s exactly what happened in Seattle, as senior point guard Andrew Andrews leads the way in Whelan’s list.
