Court Report: Cooper Flagg vs. Johni Broome is becoming one of the best national player of the year races ever

Cooper Flagg vs. Johni Broome is pacing, both statistically and cosmetically, to potentially be the best two-man national player of the year race in the history of modern college basketball.

For about six weeks, I’d been hoping that we’d get to this point but was skeptical the race would be this close and that these two could outrun the field. One week into February, it is and they are.

Let’s dive into the angles and details, because this NPOY chase has a chance to become the No. 1 story in college hoops in the lead-up to the NCAA Tournament. 

In most seasons, the player picked as college basketball’s best usually winds up in mid-March with a tangible gap between them and the two or three first team All-Americans who couldn’t quite level up. Every so often, when we’re lucky, there is a true down-to-the-wire battle that ends with split ballots. If college basketball’s voting collective had to log its choice today for Broome or Flagg (right now, there is no close third choice), it’s probable the two would wind up splitting NPOY honors. 

That’s a boost for hoops.

In addition to their wowing stats (I’ll get there in a minute) pitting Broome and Flagg against each other provides some captivating narrative juxtapositions. At 22, Broome is 53 months older than Flagg and is a former three-star recruit who ranked 471st in his class and started in the Ohio Valley Conference at Morehead State. He is using all five years of college eligibility afforded to him to leverage himself into an NBA player. 

Players with those type of backgrounds almost never find themselves in the NPOY conversation. 

On the flip side, the 18-year-old Flagg was identified as a basketball wunderkind by 15 years old, has adapted to having most eyes in the gym fixated on him for just about every game he’s played over the past three years while biding his time en route to being the No. 1 pick after suiting up for college hoops royalty.

In all years prior when we’ve had two players, or even three, in a jostle for national player of the year, those guys are almost exclusively juniors or seniors. Never has a freshman been involved in a race like this, let alone a freshman vs. a fifth-year senior. 

Broome and Flagg are stars on currently the two best teams in college basketball, something that became evident by the end of December and hasn’t missed a beat since. The teams have combined to win 30 in a row. By its nature, the national player of the year award goes to someone on one of the best teams. But to have the two guys so clearly be the best on two teams that, simultaneously, are also so clearly the best? We almost never get this. 

The programs they represent are vastly different, which ups the intrigue. There have been 10 seasons in which a Blue Devil has won a national player of the year award. Auburn: zero. Duke has 33 consensus All-Americans amongst its ranks; Auburn has two. The Tigers had little history to boast on about before Bruce Pearl got there. Duke is the posh class of college hoops, with five national titles, 17 Final Fours, fourth in all-time victories and arguably the greatest coach in the sport’s history still walking its halls in his retirement. 

Almost every previous close race for NPOY didn’t get the bonus of the players facing each other in nonconference play that same season, but we got in December when Flagg’s beat Broome’s guy at Cameron Indoor 84-78. It’s Auburn’s only loss to date. In that game, Flagg won the stat matchup in addition to the final score: 22 points, 11 boards, four assists, three steals and two blocks to Broome’s 20 points, 12 boards, three assists, one block and a foul-out.

It’s reached the point where we’re tracking every performance from every game to compare the two to see whose nose is ahead. Broome had another beefed-up stat line Tuesday night: 15 points, six assists, five rebounds, three blocks and three steals in Auburn’s 98-70 win over Oklahoma. Flagg gets his chance to one-up Wednesday night at Syracuse. 

You want more? I’ve got plenty more.

Flagg is pacing to be the first player to average 20 points, eight rebounds, four assists, one steal and one block since Penny Hardaway in 1992-93.

Broome is pacing to be the first player to average 18 points, 11 rebounds, three assists and two blocks since Tim Duncan in 1996-97.

They’re easily 1-2 in KenPom.com’s player of the year algorithm — and both rank top-five in that metric’s 15-year database. 

Broome plays in by far the best conference in the country, bolstering his case because he’s undoubtedly facing tougher competition, while Flagg is feasting on maybe the worst ACC ever. Even if the ACC is down, consider there has never been anyone this young look this great in college hoops. Flagg casually flourishing against guys three, four, five years his senior is ridiculous.

Want to see the head-to-head stats? Let’s go. I’m including traditional and advanced stats. Keep in mind Flagg averages more minutes per game (32.0 to 28.2) because Broome twice had in-game injuries this season that nudged down his per-game averages. The asterisk indicates which of the two is better.

The tally? Broome beats Flagg 7-5. Broome is No. 2 nationally in PER, while Flagg is top-20. Broome is No. 1 in box score plus/minus, Flagg No. 2 in the sport.

Flagg also has the distinction of leading his team in all five major statistical categories, something only one other freshman has ever done. 

Let’s hope that this race continues apace, with Flagg and Broome, Broome and Flagg, jockeying against each other while Auburn and Duke push for top seeds. In a fabulous season for college basketball, this can be a defining plot point. If you want recent comparisons, I took a joy ride and dug up the toss-up NPOY races over the past 40 years. While many of them were excellent, none featured the unquestioned two best players in the sport also playing for the unquestioned two best teams. Keep going fellas, you’re racing toward history.

Texas Tech too good to be labeled Final Four sleeper

I’m riveted by the Red Raiders of Texas Tech. They were off everyone’s radar through the first 11 weeks of the season, understandably so. TTU was 4-1, then 7-2, then 9-3, then 11-4. Just plodding along. By mid-January it carried a grand total of one Quad 1 win.  It didn’t crack the rankings until nine days ago. 

The computers consistently disagreed. Texas Tech (18-4) has rated top-20 in predictive metrics for more than 80% of the season. This week, the high point: No. 6 at EvanMiya, No. 8 in the NET and Torvik, No. 9 at KenPom after flashing past Baylor on Tuesday with a 73-59 victory. The Red Raiders sank 11 treys (all of them rocking the home venue) and only committed eight turnovers. That win came three days removed from one of the best games of the season, TTU’s 82-81 conquest in OT at Houston, snapping the Cougars’ nation-leading 33-game home winning streak.

“What they’re doing there really is a standard that’s different,” Texas Tech coach Grant McCasland told CBS Sports. “How they physically impose their will on people at home is something you really can’t prepare yourself for it but you better be prepared for when it happens.”

McCasland was in no way prepared for something else: the quickest ejection of his career. And only his second at that.

TTU won without McCasland and leading scorer JT Toppin, both getting booted less than four minutes in. Toppin was disqualified for what appeared to be an unintentional foot to the groin of JoJo Tugler; McCasland got the hook after he blew his top for how Toppin was tossed. McCasland told me he and Toppin watched the game from the locker room together. (The only other ejection for McCasland, 48, came in December 2010 when he earned a walk while coaching in D-II at Midwestern State.)

“He was cheering and coaching our team,” McCasland told me of Toppin, adding that he called his mother to let her know the kick wasn’t on purpose. “Actually was awesome to hear how bad he wanted us to win.”

Chance McMillian stepped up Saturday to score 23, while point guard Elijah Hawkins had 17 going against one of the toughest defenses in college basketball. Even Darrion Williams got 13 points at less than 100% (right ankle). As a result, the Red Raiders moved up to No. 13 in the AP Top 25 this week. McCasland has been earnestly preaching togetherness with his team. It showed; Tech overcame a 66-60 deficit with less than four minutes remaining. 

“I think the things you have to be consumed with are, one, how do you deepen the relationship with your team and players? I honestly think that’s it,” McCasland said. “You start using people and you start having expectations like they’re robots, I think you lose your team. … That’s the thing I care about the most. How do we get these dudes to really care for each other, that’s when I think we’ll play our best in these tough moments.”

McCasland’s coaching dogma is leading to program-defining accomplishments. The Red Raiders’ 9-2 league record is the school’s best 11-game start since joining Big 12 in 1996-97. TTU is 5-0 on the road in Big 12, the only team without a scratch away from home. That’s why its metrics are so good — and outpacing its 4/5-seed projection (for now). It’s a jump from last season, when Tech earned a No. 6 seed but oddly didn’t have nearly as good of a defense as McCasland had at North Texas, when his assistant Ross Hodge (now the head coach there) was running the show.

“Jeff Linder’s a brilliant offensive mind and we’ve got great offensive players, we just weren’t the best defensive team,” McCasland said. 

It took them a bit to get good on defense. Now they’re flirting with great: fifth-best in per-possession defense nationally since Jan. 12. This team has more reliable depth, too. Last year’s squad wasn’t durable or deep or defensive-minded, all of it factoring into Tech’s first round upset against Final Four-bound NC State.

“These days, putting teams together and building teams, it’s about how you finish,” McCasland said.

Overlooked no more, Texas Tech commands our attention. Next up is the game of the week in the Big 12 between the two hottest teams in the conference: Tech travels to 20th-ranked Arizona Wednesday. The teams are a combined 21-2 in their last 23 games.

Mizzou’s majestic turnaround is historic

On Saturday the No. 15 Missouri Tigers logged their largest road win over a ranked team in school history, 88-61 at No. 14 Mississippi State. Their most recent away game against a ranked foe prior to that was Jan. 14, an eye-opening 83-82 upset at No. 5 Florida. As a result, Mizzou’s won back-to-back roadies over AP Top 25 teams for the first time in 26 years. The Tigers have another taxing task tonight at No. 4 Tennessee, but regardless of how that one goes, Mizzou coach Dennis Gates and his staff are pulling off one of the best turnarounds in college hoops this season — and ever, really. Here’s the context.

Easy as it might be to forget (unless you’re a Mizzou fan), the Tigers went winless (0-19) against SEC competition a year ago, the drop-off a shocking disappointment following his debut season featuring 25 victories and a No. 7 seed in the 2023 tournament. At 17-4, Missouri has its groove back and is heading toward a really good NCAA seed, with Gates now firmly in the national-coach-of-the-year conversation as a result. We almost never see a high-major outfit go from godawful in league play to qualifying for the NCAA tourney in a year’s time.

Missouri might set a couple of records this season. Here’s one.

Here’s the other.

Since the NCAAs expanded to 64 teams in 1985, there have been 23 instances in power conferences (or leagues nearly at that stature, such as old Conference USA, the Atlantic 10 of the 1990s, the SWC, etc.) of teams going winless in league play. Only two teams have flipped to make a tournament run the next season.

In 2021-22, Iowa State skyrocketed from two to 22 wins year-over-year, the biggest high-major turnaround in history. It earned a No. 11 seed. Missouri is tracking well ahead of that from a seed perspective. In KenPom terms, ISU was 171 in ’20-21 then finished 43rd (128 spots), while Mizzou was 145th last season and is 23rd today (122).

The only other team to do this was Maryland, which went 0-14 in the ACC in 1986-87 (the first year after Lefty Driesell) then got a No. 7 seed the following season and made the second round. These Tigers are destined to be the third group to pull it off, and probably to bigger margins than anyone (consider how great this SEC is), making them perhaps the best high-major turnaround team of all time. I’ve got more on Gates further below.

@ me

Find me on Bluesky or  X/Twitter and drop a Q anytime!

It was a terrible procedure and a misinterpretation of the rule. At worst, it should have been a Flagrant 1. To eject JT Toppin less than four minutes into the game (after he’d exhibited no ill will or agitation with Houston, I’ll add) was a gross miscalculation by the officiating crew, led by Bert Smith. Sources indicate there won’t be any discipline or intentional reassignments of that crew, but I’ll be interested to know if they wind up working a TTU game again before the end of the regular season.

Leonard Hamilton announced Monday he would retire at the end of this season, which was long expected. Not sure if Dennis Gates would be the first call — he’s got a big buyout — but I expect FSU leadership to peek into the former Hamilton assistant. Names also being floated include former FSU guard/Sacramento Kings assistant Luke Loucks, Samford’s Bucky McMillan, McNeese’s Will Wade and Charleston coach Chris Mack. More will get involved. It’s a job that will appeal to plenty, but not everybody. The ACC is down and there is a window to capitalize. Kinda wonder if Chris Jans is a sleeper nominee there, too.

(Here’s the article referenced.) As for the Q, this isn’t all true. In fact, it’s primarily AJ Storr, who was a 35.2% 3-point shooter in his first two seasons at St. John’s and Wisconsin. In 22 games at Kansas, he’s down to 27.5% on just 2.3 attempts per game, the lowest rate of his career. South Dakota State transfer Zeke Mayo is a career 38.6% 3-point shooter; he’s 39.4% this season with KU. Rylen Griffen? 35.9% through 2.5 seasons, but cruising above that at 38.4% this year. The issue is those three have yet to all play really well in the same game together. But hey, Kansas positively strolled to its 69-52 win Monday over No. 8 Iowa State, leveling with the Cyclones in the Big 12 (7-4).

This question is tied to Monday’s news that UConn and Arizona have agreed to a home-and-home for the next two seasons. Funnily enough, word emerged less than 48 hours after Bobby Hurley refused to shake Tommy Lloyd’s hand following Arizona’s win at ASU. Now Dan Hurley is on the books to meet up with Lloyd. I love the timing! To your question, no, I don’t think UConn’s done. Hurley is an ambitious scheduler, and now that he’s out on three-team MTEs, the Huskies will need to beef up and should be adding another big-time program for a home-and-home for next season.

Norlander’s news + nuggets

• This is trite but it is so true: St. John’s being this good and mattering again this much makes the Big East feel bigger and college basketball feel more appealing. SJU got to 20-3 after beating Marquette Tuesday. We’ve waited 25 years for the Johnnies to finally be relevant. Gampel on Friday night is going to be a rock concert. I can’t wait to get there.
• Here’s a stat: UConn won Saturday at Marquette despite having 25 turnovers to MU’s eight. It’s the only time in at LEAST the last 15 and a half years that a team was -17 in turnover margin yet won on the road vs. a ranked opponent.  
• Ole Miss’ 98-84 win over No. 14 Kentucky was big for three reasons: 1) it ended Mississippi’s nine-game losing streak at home to ranked opponents; 2) it stopped a slump wherein the Rebels dropped four of their previous five; and 3) the schedule ahead puts Chris Beard’s team on the road for four of the next five. Needed that W.
• Terrible news for Northwestern: Senior Brooks Barnhizer’s college career is over due to a broken foot. Barnhizer averaged 17.1 points, 8.8 rebounds, 4.2 assists and 2.3 steals. An ox of a player — who seemed to treat the basketball court like a rugby field. I know it narrowly beat USC on Tuesday night, but NU’s faint NCAAT hopes are dashed without Barnhizer available.
• Tennessee is the holder of a surprising record. Thanks to its home win against Florida on Saturday, it’s now the only team in the SEC to ever win six straight home games vs. top-five opponents. Florida, by the by, has still never won a top-10 road matchup. And its 24.5% field goal rate at UT was the lowest ever in a game for the Gators. Yes: EVER.
• Iowa State gonna turn it around? Absolutely. The schedule eases for the next four games. Still, they’ve lost three straight and four of six. ISU’s 19-point home loss to K-State was the second-largest margin of defeat by a top-five team at home to an unranked opponent in the last 30 years. (2014: No. 4 Villanova lost 98-68 to Creighton.) They weren’t ready Monday at the Phog. I predict this is a mid-season lull that costs them a 1-seed but won’t prevent a path to making the Sweet 16, minimally.
• There are 11 teams with three or fewer losses. Ten of them are ranked top-60 in most predictive metrics, and then there’s 16-3 Marist (217th at KenPom). The Red Foxes have never been better this deep into a season. John Dunne’s team sits atop the MAAC. It last danced in 1987.
• Pitt’s 16-point home loss to Virginia on Monday was so bad, it should disqualify the Panthers on a fundamental level from at-large consideration moving forward. No excuse for that no-show. 
• Great nugget dug up by Connor Hope of The Heat Check: Gonzaga is a bona fide bubble team this season and the reason is a regression to the close-game mean. Winless (0-7) in two-possession/OT games this season after a 38-21 record in those scenarios the previous nine seasons combined. Also: Gonzaga is three games behind in the WCC race, marking only the second time this has ever happened in Mark Few’s tenure (2010-11).
• William & Mary is 8-2 in a competitive CAA chase after beating Charleston on Monday. Make time to read our Zach Pereles, who spotlighted the Tribe earlier this week. Never made the NCAAs. Does it finally break through in 2025?
• Profanity warning, but I can’t not link to this AI-written parody of an old Bob Knight speech that hit social media recently. It changed my weekend. It might have changed my February. I’m still laughing. AI is terrible for like 94% of its usage, but this falls into that other 6%. 
• With the Super Bowl going down in New Orleans on Sunday, my bud Jeff Eisenberg at Yahoo wrote a big piece that makes the case for the Superdome as the most historic American sporting venue. There’s a LOT on the college hoops side to bolster the case: Jordan’s winner in ’82, Keith Smart’s winner in ’87, Chris Webber’s timeout gaffe in ’93, Carmelo and Cuse winning in ’03 and the end of Coach K’s career in ’22. 
• We’ll wrap this week with a video I recommend to any college hoops fan interested in the selection process. Andy Katz lassoed in every data guru responsible for building the seven metrics that are now on NCAA team sheets. If you want to better understand how the seeding/selection process is more evolved and objective than ever, please take the time to watch this.