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With the dominant win over Wisconsin, Michigan basketball is starting to garner some national attention. And though freshman phenom center Hunter Dickinson was relatively quiet, going 5-for-10 for 12 points in the win, he’s becoming that much more of a focal point, from a national perspective.
ESPN’s Jeff Borzello put together a list of the best players in college basketball so far — not just best freshmen. Though Dickinson is a five-time Big Ten freshman of the week winner, it turns out, he may be more important than just being a really good first-year player. According to ESPN, he’s one of the best five players in the country, regardless of yearly standing.
5. Hunter Dickinson, Michigan Wolverines
With Dickinson, we encounter the first player who was nowhere to be seen in the preseason version of these rankings. Now, suddenly, the 7-1 freshman is clocking in at No. 5. Not a bad debut, one might venture to say. Dickinson’s a volume scorer in the paint who’s converting roughly three out of every four 2-point attempts. Not surprisingly, that was enough to earn the young man a starting spot after he had watched UM’s first five opening tips from the bench. If it’s curious that the leading scorer (at 18 per game) for a team that might earn a No. 1 seed was left off last week’s Wooden Award midseason top 25 watch list, it is a curiosity that can and likely will be rectified. Dickinson can still be included on the final ballot of 15 players.
That’s a huge emergence for a player who wasn’t on anyone’s radar before the season, and one that didn’t even start at the outset. As a matter of fact, Dickinson only got into the starting lineup once fifth-year center Austin Davis suffered a plantar fasciitis injury a few games in.
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