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Jawun Evans’ Amazing Freshman Year Compares To Stars of Last 25 Years

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I was inspired to write about Jawun Evans after reading this on how he could legitimately have a Chris Paul-like second season in Stillwater. Doug Gottlieb has compared him to Paul on multiple occasions so I decided to look back on whose freshman campaigns in the last 25 years are good comps for Evans’ first.

College Basketball Reference has a sweet tool where you can look at single seasons in which a player has averaged X points, X boards and X assists per game. I did this for freshman guards since 1993 (as far back as the tool goes) who have averaged 12 points a game, 4.5 assists, 4 rebounds and 1 steal. The tool spit me back 19 names (including Evans’). I’m pretty sure you’re going to recognize a few of them.

Player Year School Rebounds Assists Steals Points
Jawun Evans 2016 OSU 4.4 4.9 1.1 12.9
D’Angelo Russell 2015 tOSU 5.7 5.0 1.6 19.3
Ray McCallum 2011 Detroit Mercy 4.7 4.9 1.6 13.5
D.J. Cooper 2010 Ohio 5.4 5.9 2.5 13.5
John Wall 2010 Kentucky 4.3 6.5 1.8 16.6
Courtney Fortson 2009 Arkansas 5.5 5.9 1.1 14.8
Nick Calathes 2008 Florida 5.2 6.1 1.6 15.3
Devin Gibson 2008 UTSA 4.1 5.1 3.3 14.1
Derrick Rose 2008 Memphis 4.5 4.7 1.2 14.9
Dominic James 2006 Marquette 4.5 5.4 1.6 15.3
Raymond Felton 2003 UNC 4.1 6.7 1.6 12.9
Jameer Nelson 2001 St. Joe’s 4.0 6.5 1.7 12.5
Jay Williams 2000 Duke 4.2 6.5 2.4 14.5
Kevin Braswell 1999 Georgetown 4.2 4.5 2.7 13.5
Chauncey Billups 1996 Colorado 6.3 5.5 1.6 17.9
Juan Bragg 1995 TCU 4.2 6.1 1.4 15.6
Randy Livingston 1995 LSU 4.0 9.4 2.5 14.0
Ladrell Whitehead 1995 Wyoming 6.2 5.4 2.9 23.2
Doron Sheffer 1994 Connecticut 5.6 7.1 3.4 17.6

Russell, Wall, Rose, Nelson and Williams. Whoooooooo boy. And Evan’s first year in college might most most resemble that of Rose. They are different players, for sure, and have much different bodies. But there are certainly worse people to compare your numbers to.

Paul doesn’t qualify because he didn’t average four boards a game, but he averaged six assists, three steals and 15 points. So you can see the error in sorting through players and numbers like this.

Still, I’m fired up to see what Evans does in Year 2. Especially in a new system that (presumably) takes advantage of his outrageous skills. Maybe Evans isn’t the next CP3 (or Rose or Russell), but he’s one of the better point guards Oklahoma State has ever had, and that’s good enough for me.

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