Top 5 UConn Point Guards

[Robertelamin]

I would never say my list is the 5 BEST point guards we had. It's just my favorites. The PG's I really, really enjoyed, and in that regard, my top five consists of a three way tie for first, followed by a 2 way tie for next.

Kemba/Bazz/Ricky
Taleik/KEA

I was watching the UConn/Oklahoma game from '04 today, and it really reminded me what a good PG TBrown was. Not many of our PGs could rifle a one handed pass off the dribble from beyond half court with deadly accuracy and timing like he could.

No way would I put Ricky or Taliek over El-Amin, but I'm biased. I think offensively Marcus was the best pure point guard. Defensively Ricky was the best but Boat might be in the conversation by the end of the year. As for leadership I think El-Amin was running things before he ever officially signed at UConn, though I would have no problem with Kemba or Shabazz.

 

[tentoes4rings]

No way would I put Ricky or Taliek over El-Amin, but I'm biased. I think offensively Marcus was the best pure point guard. Defensively Ricky was the best but Boat might be in the conversation by the end of the year. As for leadership I think El-Amin was running things before he ever officially signed at UConn, though I would have no problem with Kemba or Shabazz.

Interesting analysis. Your post brings up the point of what are we measuring them based on? Are we measuring them on team success? Numbers? Their overall game?

I loved KEA for being a huge part of the first championship but I remember games like the second 99-00 St. John's game where he got absolutely torched defensively by Barkley (who is easily 1st team all ugly by the way) and we lost by 20.

My favorite overall PG prior to Kemba and Bazz's heroics was KO. I think as far as a running a team, playing great on both sides of the ball, late game management and team success he is right up there. Had his teams gotten a ring or two I think more people would agree with me. With 5 minutes to go, I'm not sure we've had a PG I had more confidence in to pull out a W with his composure and clutch free throw shooting.

 

[tzznandrew]

Defining terms: Top 5, as I imagine it, is not a career award. At the player's peaks, where do they rank?

Kemba is, to me, clearly #1. He had the greatest individual season, and his performance took a weak, inexperienced team (sorry Chuck and Donnell) to a place they really had no right being.

#2 is difficult. As a PG season, I'm going with Shabazz, and as an overall career, I'm also going with Shabazz (and, if we're not talking positionally, but "greatest huskies," he may be #1). But Khalid is closer here than in my initial thoughts. Dude won an NCAA tournament, and would have made the Final Four the next year if it weren't for his injury. I mean, look at the 2000 bracket: if they beat Tennessee (which they would have with a healthy KEA), they get #8 seed UNC, and then #7 Tulsa for a right to the Final Four...and then #5 seed Florida in the Final Four. They had a legitimate shot of repeating were it not for an injury. Obviously counter-factuals are problematic, but we use them all the time for the 2009 team, and so it seems fair. I guess I go with Shabazz, because his team wasn't as good as KEA's 1999 team (not even close), but KEA's team had a much tougher title game. 1999 Duke would have bitch-slapped anyone in the 2014 tournament, and would have done it by dubs as they did to everyone in their tournament but UConn. So I think this is 2A and 2B for "best PG."

The remaining choices are rough: too many good players. Marcus Williams was the best passer we ever had; Doron Sheffer was probably the best combination shooter/passer we've had; AJP was probably the best shooter we had at PG; Ricky was the best defender we had--hopefully Boat combines some of all these guys into something great for his senior year. He's definitely capable of it.

 

[superjohn]

I love me some Taliek but to the people that think he is a top 5 all-time point guard, ummm no. Sometimes a player gets blasted by the fanbase over the years so much that we tend to overrate him, this seems to be the case with Taliek.

 

[tzznandrew]

I love me some Taliek but to the people that think he is a top 5 all-time point guard, ummm no. Sometimes a player gets blasted by the fanbase over the years so much that we tend to overrate him, this seems to be the case with Taliek.

A very good defensive player who was a steady leader. But he's not Top 5 overall.

That's not to demean him, either. Even though KEA, Williams, Sheffer, and AJP are all better, you couldn't replace Taliek with them because Gordon didn't play defense (Kemba or Bazz, you could).

 

[RichZ]

With 5 minutes to go, I'm not sure we've had a PG I had more confidence in to pull out a W with his composure and clutch free throw shooting.

You have a short memory. We did have that the last 2 seasons. And KO was coaching him.

 

[RichZ]

I love me some Taliek but to the people that think he is a top 5 all-time point guard, ummm no. Sometimes a player gets blasted by the fanbase over the years so much that we tend to overrate him, this seems to be the case with Taliek.

I know he wasn't one of the greatest over all, but I loved watching him play. Like I said. My list was the 5 I enjoyed the most.

 

[Kitaman]

I love me some Taliek but to the people that think he is a top 5 all-time point guard, ummm no. Sometimes a player gets blasted by the fanbase over the years so much that we tend to overrate him, this seems to be the case with Taliek.

I mentioned Taliek but not as a top 5. Posters were listing 8 or so point guards omitting Taliek.

Taliek out of respect deserves always to be an honorable mention when naming UConn PG greats. Secondly I feel obligated to bring his name up in the conversation if only that he doesn't become forgotten.

 

[SubbaBub]

If you want to base it on net baskets created (NBC) per game which IMO is the job of a point guard, the list looks like this:

1. Kemba Walker
2. Marcus Williams
3. Tate George
4. Doron Sheffer
5. Khalid El Amin
6. Chris Smith
7. Ben Gordon
8. Talik Brown
9. Shabazz Napier
10. Karl Hobbs
11. AJ Price
12. Kevin Ollie
13. Ricky Moore

I started with the career assist leaders and added number of baskets (points - 3*3FGM divided by 2) then added half the number of steal to simulate opponents baskets denied. This is the NBC.

If you add OReb, DReb, and TO's you might get a different list. but this is close enough for me. If you want to go really deep, remove baskets lost due to poor shooting. In looking through the stats, I noticed a few of these guys were a little too trigger happy especially from 3.

Williams is "helped" by only playing 70 games, while Bazz is hurt by playing 10 more games than anyone else. If you go by total NBC over their entire UConn career, it looks like this:

1. Shabazz Napier
2. Tate George
3. Talik Brown
4. Kemba Walker
5. Chris Smith
6. Khalid El Amin
7. Karl Hobbs
8. Kevin Ollie
9. Doron Sheffer
10. Ben Gordon
11. Ricky Moore
12. AJ Price
13. Marcus Williams

There are other ways to look at it. Number of All-Conference teams, All-Americans, POTY awards, and of course Conference and National Titles, but I prefer to focus on what they did when they had the ball, which is everything for a PG.

 

[Robertelamin]

This is where numbers do lie, would you really want Tate George over Sheffer, El-Amin, AJ or Nappier? Or Tate over Kemba, El-Amin, Sheffer, AJ and Marcus? No way.

 

[SubbaBub]

This is where numbers do lie, would you really want Tate George over Sheffer, El-Amin, AJ or Nappier? Or Tate over Kemba, El-Amin, Sheffer, AJ and Marcus? No way.

It is what it is. Do I think Tate was in the top 5? Not necessarily, but don't confuse style with substance. I would say 1-2 is Kemba and Chris Smith. KEA is a solid 3, with the last two spots subject to interpretation. For my money, I'll take Bazz and Williams to round out the top 5.

FWIW, I think it is not a coincidence that it's a very tough call, with all these guys having similar traits and success. It's almost as if some person purposely intended it.

 

[HailUConn]

I cannot help to get this out of my chest:


If and this is a big if, RB lead this year's squad to the first back2back Champ, it will catapult him straight to the 3rd in this list, right behind Kemba and Bazz.

Disclaimer: I did not read the whole 3 pages of posts, so if this or the like has been posted, my apologies.

 

[UconnU]

Bazz is going off right now in the preseason game.

 

[johnhuskies95]

Shabazz affected the game in just so many different ways. Also, his Junior season is still extremely underrated.

 

[mauconnfan]

A very good defensive player who was a steady leader. But he's not Top 5 overall.

That's not to demean him, either. Even though KEA, Williams, Sheffer, and AJP are all better, you couldn't replace Taliek with them because Gordon didn't play defense (Kemba or Bazz, you could).

And visi versi LOL...........

 

[champs99and04]

Defining terms: Top 5, as I imagine it, is not a career award. At the player's peaks, where do they rank?

Kemba is, to me, clearly #1. He had the greatest individual season, and his performance took a weak, inexperienced team (sorry Chuck and Donnell) to a place they really had no right being.

#2 is difficult. As a PG season, I'm going with Shabazz, and as an overall career, I'm also going with Shabazz (and, if we're not talking positionally, but "greatest huskies," he may be #1). But Khalid is closer here than in my initial thoughts. Dude won an NCAA tournament, and would have made the Final Four the next year if it weren't for his injury. I mean, look at the 2000 bracket: if they beat Tennessee (which they would have with a healthy KEA), they get #8 seed UNC, and then #7 Tulsa for a right to the Final Four...and then #5 seed Florida in the Final Four. They had a legitimate shot of repeating were it not for an injury. Obviously counter-factuals are problematic, but we use them all the time for the 2009 team, and so it seems fair. I guess I go with Shabazz, because his team wasn't as good as KEA's 1999 team (not even close), but KEA's team had a much tougher title game. 1999 Duke would have bitch-slapped anyone in the 2014 tournament, and would have done it by dubs as they did to everyone in their tournament but UConn. So I think this is 2A and 2B for "best PG."

The remaining choices are rough: too many good players. Marcus Williams was the best passer we ever had; Doron Sheffer was probably the best combination shooter/passer we've had; AJP was probably the best shooter we had at PG; Ricky was the best defender we had--hopefully Boat combines some of all these guys into something great for his senior year. He's definitely capable of it.

This is a valid point, but I believe it also re-enforces a larger distinction between point guards from the pre-one-and-done era and point guards from say, 2004 on. Your comment about 1999 Duke bitch-slapping anyone in the 2014 tournament is spot-on, but it could also be applied - arguably more so, given the way the bracket opened up - to 2011, 2009, 2006, etc. The 1999 team is, in my opinion, the best UConn team of all-time. How much do we factor that into our assessment? Conversely, KEA was never the best player on a championship team, and he was pretty much surpassed statistically across the board by Kemba and Shabazz. Could KEA have traded places with Shabazz or Kemba and won titles with those rosters? It's hard to say. What's more difficult to imagine is how Kemba and Shabazz's games would have translated in vastly different roster and competitive contexts. Think of how 2011 would have been different with guys like John Wall and Brandon Jennings in the mix.

Similarly, this conversation provokes another question that might challenge the way we view these players, and this program: have our point guards actually gotten better - relative to their predecessors - or is our coaching staff simply exploiting the inefficiencies in continuity and seasoning better than other programs? I'm not trying to make it sound like Napier and Walker would be ordinary players in different eras - they were both first round picks, and Kemba has evolved into a borderline top 50 player. I'm wondering, though, if there dominance over the college basketball landscape is more pronounced because of the high turnover rate, and, more importantly, whether this is a trend we can expect to continue. I say yes.

 

[Waquoit]

I wouldn't call Chris Smith a PG. I think Ricky Moore desrves an honorable mention.

Smith played point when John Gwynn was in the game.

 

[Waquoit]

Marcus Williams is your odd man out. He was in Storrs for the '04 title.

He may have been in Storrs but he flunked off the team. He gets no credit for that.

 

[Hans Sprungfeld]

I can only assume that you are referring to a replay from someone I have blocked. Due to the tone of the message you responded to, I can only assume it was chap.

Good call. Not reason enough to unignore , but it was a far more cogent post than one could reasonably expect. It was like he had something to say and was trying to be understood.

 

[ARIDE]

1 Kemba
2 Shabazz
3 KEA
4 Sheffer
5 Price

Best list ..Sheffer under rated by most

 

[Vancat]

I was somewhat of a basketball newbie at the time, but I think Earl Kelley needs to be in the mix.

 

[ctchamps]

These things are like beauty contests. I can come up with several lists and be happy.

I'll make a list: a list of what I consider were the most important guards for the program.

Shabazz: Was a very important player in two championships. He was also far and away the most important player that helped KO avoid the troubles Diaco is going through in football. I'm not sure KO would have gotten an extension without Shabazz and we probably would have realized KO's coaching acumen with a team other than UConn.

Chris Smith: He got the ball rolling. JC believed in UConn. Chris Smith validated JC's belief.

KEA: JC needed a kid to be a floor general. KEA was able to do this plus he was someone who could offset the intensity of the coach! I think JC became a little more relaxed with his insistence on controlling every aspect of the game after observing this guy.


Another list: In this link Candice Swanepoel and Doutzen Kroes are the two who are most pleasing to my eyes. But there is not one in that list I would argue against. I'm sure every one of them would argue against me however!

http://www.therichest.com/expensive...-2/the-10-most-beautiful-models-in-the-world/

 

[joober jones]

Marcus Williams could have been our all-time greatest point guard. In that sentence, "could" is the operative word.

 

[aceboon]

Marcus Williams could have been our all-time greatest point guard. In that sentence, "could" is the operative word.

I recently watched the Oklahoma game from the 03-04 season and the passes he was making and the feel he had for the game were ridiculous for a freshman. I know he wasn't a great athlete but if he had put the effort into his body he should've been able to stick around the league for a good decade.

 

[David 76]

I was somewhat of a basketball newbie at the time, but I think Earl Kelley needs to be in the mix.

I think Earl would be up there for potential but he had too many problems to impact our program like the others

 

[joober jones]

I recently watched the Oklahoma game from the 03-04 season and the passes he was making and the feel he had for the game were ridiculous for a freshman. I know he wasn't a great athlete but if he had put the effort into his body he should've been able to stick around the league for a good decade.

Of all the guys we ever had who didn't make it in the league, Williams is the one who really is the saddest story. There was so much potential wasted. Back in the 05-06 season I was certain he'd be a starting PG in the NBA for at least 10 years. I also thought Marcus Johnson was going to be a star for us and eventually on the next level when he got 2 starts late in the season and posted 17 and 20 points while playing great defense.

If you told me back then that in 2014 Marcus Williams, Josh Boone, Hilton Armstrong, Denham Brown, Rashad Anderson and Marcus Johnson wouldn't be in the NBA but Jeff Adrien would, I would never have believed it.