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Men's Basketball
Player of the Year Award Easiest Slam Dunk of the Season
By Brandon CastelCOMMENTARY – The Big Ten will announce its post-season awards and all-conference teams today at 7:30 p.m. on the Big Ten Network.
Evan Turner - Slam Dunk
Photo by Jim DavidsonOSU's Evan Turner is a slam dunk to win that award, but even if the voters somehow give it to someone else, there is little question that Ohio State’s 6-7 junior is the premier player in the Big Ten.
For starters, the Chicago native nearly won the award last season as a sophomore when he averaged 17.3 points, 7.1 rebounds and four assists for a Buckeye team that tied for fourth in the conference standings. Instead, it went to Michigan State point guard Kalin Lucas, who’s Spartans won the conference regular-season title by four games.
With their win over Illinois last Tuesday, Turner’s Buckeyes cut down the nets at Value City Arena for the first time in his three seasons in Columbus. They were later joined by MSU and Purdue in a three-way tie for the regular season Big Ten title, but that takes nothing away from Turner’s contribution to an improbable championship run.
Not only did Turner lead the conference in scoring at 19.5 points per game this season, but rebounding (9.4 a night) as well. He was second in steals (by one-10th of a steal) and ninth in blocks despite the fact he spent nearly the entire season playing point guard for the Buckeyes.
And therein may lay Turner’s biggest transformation this season. After playing the wing during his first two seasons in college, he was asked by coach Thad Matta to move to point guard on a full-time basis in the off-season.
Evan Turner brings the ball up court in his role as a point guard.
Photo by Jim DavidsonThe results were stunning.
Despite never playing the position before, the previously turnover-prone Turner finished second in the Big Ten with 5.8 assists a night. That’s an assist and a half more than Penn State point guard Talor Battle, who finished third in the conference, and only an assist fewer per night than Illinois point guard, and Turner’s high school teammate, Demetri McCamey.
At one point it looked like McCamey might be among those to challenge Turner for the POY this season, but the Illini lost five out of six down the stretch, including both games against Turner, to finish in fifth place in the Big Ten.
Lucas, the reigning Big Ten Player of the Year, put up solid numbers once again for Tom Izzo’s Spartans. His shooting percentage actually rose nearly 60 points from last season, but he saw a drop in a number of other statistical areas including assists, rebounds, free throw shooting and three-point shooting.
The numbers put Purdue’s duo of E’Twaun Moore and Robbie Hummel right in the mix for player of the year, but Turner’s impact on the 2009-10 basketball season was so much more than numbers. His flawless transition to point guard allowed Matta to get David Lighty back on the court this season without having to take Jon Diebler or William Buford out of the lineup.
The Buckeyes were just 3-3 when Turner was out of the lineup this season compared to 21-4 when he was on the court. He broke his back on Dec. 5th – that’s not a typo, he literally fractured two vertebrae in his lower back against Eastern Michigan – and somehow he was back on the court a month later when the Buckeyes hosted Indiana on Jan. 6 th.
He is the one player in college basketball who actually could “mess around and get a triple-double” (he had two of them during the season) and his ability to get his teammates involved in the offense has the fifth-ranked (AP) Buckeyes primed for a deep run in the NCAA Tournament later this month.
His game is a little bit of LeBron James – certainly not on the same level athletically, then again who is?– and a little bit Kobe Bryant. What he lacks in an outside shot, he makes up for with his effortless ability to drive past multiple defenders for an easy basket around the rim. Even on an off night he is going to finish with 18 and 11, and if his percentages were better from behind the arc or the free throw line, he probably could have led the nation in scoring.
He’s a finisher; both at the rim and in games. His 23-point second-half performance at Purdue – a game in which he scored 14 straight points to lead the Buckeyes from 13 down to upset the No. 4 team in the country on their own floor – may have been the signature performance in the Big Ten, if not the country, all season long.
He had a triple double (14-11-17) in the season-opener and went on to record 14 double-doubles, 11 games of 20 points or more and two games with where he went for 32, including that win at Purdue.
He is the best player in the conference, a future top-five NBA draft pick, and with all due respect to the other candidates, if there was ever an open-and-shut case for Player of the Year in the Big Ten, this is it.
Stat Comparison (Top 5 Contenders):
Evan Turner (OSU) – 19.5 pts, 9.4 reb, 5.8 ast, 1.8 stl, 54% shooting
Kalin Lucas (MSU) – 14.8 pts, 1.9 reb, 3.9 ast, 1.1 stl, 46% shooting
E’Twaun Moore (Purdue) – 16.7 pts, 3.6 reb, 2.9 ast, 1.4 stl, 47% shooting
Robbie Hummel (Purdue) – 15.7 pts, 6.9 reb, 2.1 ast, 1.1 stl, 46% shooting
Demetri McCamey (Ill.) – 14.9 pts, 3.2 reb, 6.8 ast, 1.2 stl, 47% shooting
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