Marquette Insider Wooden Award Snubs- Jae Crowder

[THEultimateWARRIOR]

Awesome picture of Jae too if you click the link.

Let's start by looking at the Marquette Golden Eagles. To be sure, senior guard Darius Johnson-Odom is one of the best players in the country. He made noise as a sophomore with his lights-out shooting and has since evolved into a more complete player. To complement his long-range shooting (37.5 percent on 3-pointers), Johnson-Odom has worked on his midrange game and is converting 2-point field goals at a rate of 49.6 percent. The guard has the highest usage rate on the squad (23.4 percent) but surprisingly, for a player who utilizes such a high percentage of the shots taken in the Marquette offense, DJO is not the most efficient Golden Eagle. That title belongs to senior forward Jae Crowder, who has a higher PER (28.48, third in the Big East) than Johnson-Odom and a usage rate of just 19.1 percent. Yet Crowder's offense rating (1.24, per Ken Pomeroy) dwarfs any of his teammates, and he has connected on 60 percent of his 2-pointers and a shade better than DJO on 3s (37.9 percent).

If we assume DJO deserves the honor of being on the Wooden midseason list, then Crowder does, too. Crowder is so unique because of his ability as a 6-foot-6 "switchable" -- Marquette coach Buzz Williams' term for the type of versatile player he likes to recruit to Milwaukee. Per Pomeroy, Crowder leads the squad in both steal and block rates, and he is the Golden Eagles' best defender by far. Overall, whomever Crowder matches up with tends to fair poorly (0.77 points per possession) and the senior is possibly the only Marquette player capable of defending bigs (0.54 points per post-up possession) as well as perimeter opponents looking to isolate (0.35 points per possession).

http://insider.espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/7470519/ncb-marquette-jae-crowder-wooden-award-snubs

[THEultimateWARRIOR]

I have to strongly disagree with ESPN saying Jae is our best defender. Maybe statistically but he is not even in the top 2 defenders on this team IMO.