Locked On Jayhawks - Daily Podcast On Kansas Jayhawks Football & Basketball - Why Johnny Furphy Should Win Big 12 Freshman of the Year + Award Candidates for Kansas Jayhawks

Episode Date: February 21, 2024

Why Kansas Jayhawks basketball freshman guard/wing Johnny Furphy from Australia should be the front-runner for Big 12 Freshman of the Year in 2024, Kevin McCullar and Hunter Dickinson's chances to win Player of the Year, All-League candidacies for them and Dajuan Harris, and why Furphy and KJ Adams should be considered for Most Improved player. Plus, Kansas Jayhawks women's basketball has won five in a row as they attempt to push toward the NCAA Tournament.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors!IbottaRight now, Ibotta is offering our listeners $5 just for trying Ibotta by using the code LOCKEDONCOLLEGE when you register.LinkedInThese days every new potential hire can feel like a high stakes wager for your small business. That’s why LinkedIn Jobs helps find the right people for your team, faster and for free. Post your job for free at LinkedIn.com/lockedoncollege. Terms and conditions apply.GametimeDownload the Gametime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase.FanDuelNew customers, join today and you’ll getONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS in BONUS BETS if your first bet of FIVE DOLLARS or more wins. Visit FanDuel.com/LOCKEDON to get started.eBay MotorsWith all the parts you need at the prices you want, it’s easy to turn your car into the MVP and bring home that win. Keep your ride-or-die alive at EbayMotors.com. Eligible items only. Exclusions apply. eBay Guaranteed Fit only available to US customers.FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On today's Locked on Jayhawks, which KU players could and should win some Big 12 awards and why Johnny Furphy should be your 2024 Big 12 freshman of the year. You are Locked on Jayhawks, your daily podcast on the Kansas Jayhawks, part of the Locked on Podcast Network, your team every day. I'm Derek Johnson. You can find me here with Locked on Jayhawks. You can also find me on social media at DJhawks on Twitter and X. Thanks for making Locked on Jayhawks your first listen every day. We are free and available anywhere you get your podcasts, including on our YouTube page where you can like and subscribe to the show. On today's episode of the show,

we're talking about all Big 12 awards for KU basketball, who could and should be winning some of these awards for the Jayhawks, why Johnny Furphy, to me, should win Big 12 Player of the Year. We're going to make that case on today's episode. And also, I want to get into why Furphy and KJ Adams should both be considered for the Big 12's Most Improved Player of the Year Award, too, plus some on KU Women's Basketball basketball who is really starting to find some momentum at the end of the year as they try to make it into the NCAA tournament. First, this episode of the show is brought to you by GameTime. Download the GameTime app, create an account, and use code LOCKEDON for $20 off your first purchase with GameTime.

So let's start here. The Big 12 Player of the Year race and first team All-Big 12. I think these are kind of one in the same conversation in that Kevin McCuller and Hunter Dickinson are both Big 12 Player of the Year candidates and therefore they are first team All-Big 12 candidates as well. The one question I have, you know, because right now Kansas is in fourth place of the Big 12. If KU winds up in fourth place of a 14-team conference with some of the other best teams in the country, isn't that a little weird to get two teams on the first-team all-conference? Now, that is not really why KU wouldn't win the conference.

It would be more about the depth, and this is just picking players. But you don't see that that often, I guess is my point, but they're both putting up monstrous enough numbers. And without either of them, Kansas is obviously way further down than fourth. So I think both of them will deserve to be on the first team All-Big 12 list. But I guess what I'm saying is if KU does wind up finishing fourth in the league, would it shock you if they went, okay, we're going to put two Houston guys if they win the Big 12 with LJ Cryer, the way he's playing, and Jamal Shedd. And we're going to put two Houston guys if they win the Big 12 with LJ Cryer the way he's playing and Jamal Shedd and we're going to put Tameen Lipsy

for for an Iowa State representative and he's had you know a good year although some of the numbers have dipped off a bit in Big 12 play and then we're going to put you know one of the other guys who's up there who's putting up big numbers whether it's somebody from you know one of the other top teams like you look at Baylor has a couple of different candidates, or you look at somebody who's just maybe putting up monster numbers across the conference. I don't know. And so already, if you're talking about, well, three spots between the two Houston guys and the one Iowa State guy, you know, if you get one more spot on there, then it's only one of Kevin or Hunter Dickinson. I don't necessarily think that's going to happen, but I think it's interesting for the Big 12 player

of the year specifically. If you look around at some of the different websites, what they have, let's start with Evan Miyakawa. This is the BPR on Evan Miyakawa's website, evanmiya.com. It's basically Bayesian performance rating, which basically looks at how your team does, how you do when you're on and off the court and everything. And the total BPR is the combination of the offensive BPR and the defensive BPR.

Jamal Shedd is in first of the Big 12 right now, and it is a wide margin between first, second. Now you look at some of the counting stats with Jamal Shedd, some of the total numbers, and it's not as good as some of the other players, but they play at such a slow tempo. He has such an impact on the defensive end that it makes sense why. You have to go down to Hunter Dickinson at fourth and Kevin McCuller at fifth until you get to the top KU players on that list. Then you go look at Ken Palm.

Ken Palm has their player of the year ratings at KenPalm.com. You go to the Big 12. Jamal Shedd is in first. Hunter Dickinson in second. You have Kevin McCuller in fourth. Obviously, missing a couple games for Kevin hurt him a little bit in some of those. Then you look at Bart Torvik, which has this thing called points over replacement per adjusted game at that usage or he abbreviates it as PRPG and again you end up with KU players Kevin McCullers in at number three

Hunter Dickinson is down at number six and so I feel like a lot of the talk has been that Kevin McCuller and Hunter Dickinson are at the top of that Big 12 player of the year conversation. But because Kansas has fallen to third or fourth in the league, I think it really does open the door for one of these other players to win it. Now, if Kansas can end up at least sharing the Big 12 title, I think it'll be Kevin McCuller or Hunter Dickinson's award to lose because of those counting stats. But if they don't end up winning the league, I feel like it is going to go to Jamal shed or, you know, maybe if Iowa state wins the league or something, I am recording this on Monday night before the Iowa state Houston game for what it's worth. So some of those numbers, you know, could be impacted by that and maybe to mean lipsy takes elite,

whatever it is. But the point being that, you know, this isn't a slam dunk that one of the KU players wins the award. Maybe you're of the belief. It should just go to the winning team in the big 12. Maybe you're of the belief that it's player of the year. It's not a team award. Either way, I think they'll have a shot at it. But I guess point being, when you look at some of those other sites, it's not as home run of a case as you could possibly think. When you look at some of the other awards, the one that really sticks out to me as maybe the most interesting here for the race is going to be the freshman of the year. Because I feel like with

the player of the year, it is going to kind the freshman of the year, because I feel like with the player of the year, it is going to kind of come down to, you know, which team does end up winning whether you think it should or not with the freshman of the year, that's a little less impactful. And if you would have said Johnny first, we'd be in the running for big 12 freshmen of the year, you know, when the season started or through the first month or two, when he's coming off the bench, you would have thought, okay, are you sure?

He's he's behind El Marco Jackson in the starting lineup on his own team, and El Marco's not putting up big numbers, and he's got some good freshmen around the conference. Oklahoma State's starting a couple freshmen in the front line. Baylor's got a couple stud freshmen in there, right? You go across the country or across the conference, and there's a lot of good freshmen out there. But the way that Johnny Furphy has taken over as a starter

really has vaulted him into this, I guess, award consideration. And not just consideration. For my money, Johnny Furphy should be the frontrunner right now for Big 12 Freshman of the Year. Now, I will say, if you go off just pure total stats for the season, then maybe you don't come to that conclusion. And I'm totally okay with that argument that you want to make. I've always been somebody that I think the big 12 awards should, yes, you should factor in what happened in the non-con with some of the stats, but I think it's all big 12 awards. They should be weighted more heavily to what you did in conference play. So if you average, you know, 9.5 rebounds in non-con, but then you average 13 and 7 in conference play,

and collectively that puts you at like 11.6 rebounds. Those don't look like super big all-conference numbers, but you just look at the 13 and 7 you average in conference plays. Those would be, you know, closer to maybe not first team, but, you know, second or third team or something like that. Then I think you put more weight on what happened in the actual Big 12 plays since they're all Big 12 awards. Not everybody votes like that, and that's totally understandable

if that's how you want to view it. That's how I view it, though. And so it is interesting, though. There's only five freshmen in the Big 12 who are averaging eight or more points per game on the season. Again, this is as of Monday night before some of the games go final. Johnny Furphy is one of the five who's averaging eight or more points per game, and that does take into account both the non-con and conference play. So that's not just cheating

and looking off of some of the big 12 stats at this point, which I mean, if you're just looking at it from that standpoint, there's five players who are doing eight or more points per game. I think there's only one more player who's doing seven or more points per game, which would be a jizzle James at Cincinnati. It would make you think that Furphy is probably pretty close to lock to being on the all freshmen team at the very least. The old newcomer team will certainly be interesting with I mean, Hunter Dickinson, LJ Cryer,

that could come down to kind of the wire there. And honestly, I don't even remember if there is a big 12 freshmen of the year. I thought they did add it because of, you know, they used to just have newcomer of the year, but now with all the transfers, you wanted something separate for this. But I think it's a fun conversation. You really have four guys.

I said five guys are averaging eight or more points per game. Eric Daly Jr. is one of them, but in Big 12 only play, he's averaging like seven and a half points per game. So I think it's really between four guys from Big 12 freshman of the year. Johnny Furphy, Jacoby Walter at Baylor, their freshman guard, Milan Mamchilovic, the freshman stretch four for Iowa State, and Yves Misi, the freshman center for Baylor. If you're watching on our YouTube, I've got a fancy, dandy, little,

crummy-looking graphic that we're going to throw up, and it shows the comparison that I'll try to explain for our audio listeners among those three other players. So this is big 12 only stats through February 18th of 2024. Furfies at 12.1 points per game. That is second among the group of four. Only players averaging more points among this group of Furfie, Meecy, Momchilvich, and Walter is Jacoby Walter at 12.9. Rebounds per game.

Furfies at 6.2. That's actually the leader among the group. Furfies at 6.2. That's actually the leader among the group. Furphy's at 1.3 assists. That is tied second among the group. Walter's at 1.8. Steals per game, 1.2. That is tied first for Johnny Furphy. Blocks per game, he's second at 0.4, only behind Yves Misi, who is a big man, at 1.2. Field goal percentage, he is second at 53.6%. Yves Misi is at 61.9%, which again, being a big man helps a little bit there. Interestingly enough, Monchilovich and Walter are both under 40% from the field. Three-point percentage.

Furphy is the leader there among this group of four, 40.4%. Then you go to free throw percentage. Furphy would be third there with Walter at 84.4%. Monchilovich at 76%. Furphy's at 75. But you look at true shooting percentage, which takes into account where you're getting your shots from, so it's giving extra weight to three-point shots and free throws and stuff.

Furfies at 67.7%. That is the best true shooting percentage of the bunch, even over Meecy. And then you look at Momchilovich and Walter, who are under 50%. Effective field goal percentage. Furfies at 65.5%. Meecy's at 64.6%. And again, he's a big man. You have a better effective field goal percentage Furphy's at 65.5 percent Meecy's at 64.6 and again he's a big man you have a better effective field goal percentage than him O rating when you're on the court 139 that is insane for Furphy that's better than Meecy who's at 132.9 better than Walters at 110.6 Momchilovich at 105 Furphy even has the best D rating among this

four group of four freshmen at 102.2. You want to be lower on the D rating, and Meecy would be third in that, Momchilovich second, and Walter would be last in that. So you go across the board. Every one of those stats, points, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks, field goal percentage, three-point percentage, free throw percentage, true shooting percentage, effective field goal percentage, O rating, D rating. In Big 12 only play through February 18th, furphy is top two among this group of four in every category but one

and he's the leader in six of those categories and so i think you look at that impact and how he has changed this season for ku to me he is bar none well maybe not bar none because it's it's close enough that if furphy struggles over the last couple weeks and Eves Meecy has a couple big double-doubles and maybe goes for 20-10 and they beat Kansas in Waco, then yes, maybe that could sway things. I'm open enough to that happening, but I think as of right now, to me, Furphy's the Big 12 Freshman of the Year. All right, we're going to continue on with the show talking some more award possibilities when I think KJ and Furphy should be considered for Big 12's most improved player on this

episode of Locked on Jayhawks. First, we were brought to you by GameTime. Download the GameTime app today because buying tickets to your favorite sporting event should not be stressful. And GameTime is going to get rid of that stress. It's going to make it so much easier for you with killer deals on last-minute tickets and their best price guarantee. You can get exclusive flash deals on tickets for football, basketball, baseball, concerts, comedy, theater, and more. The game time guarantee means you'll always get the best price.

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guaranteed so more uh award talk here for what could happen for KU you know it's interesting because Kevin McCuller and Hunter Dickinson if both don't get on the first team one will be on the first team and one will be on the second team right that's kind of the the bar none last year though you had Jalen Wilson on the first team you had uh uh Grady Dick on the second team you had Kevin McCuller on the third team and then you got honorable mention nod for Dewan harris and kj adams ended up with most improved player a year ago this year i don't know if ku will get anyone else on the second or third team besides again if one of hunter kevin drops the second team which at this point i would assume both are going to be on the first team but like i said i you know kind of carved out a possible path of how you could get there um i don't think DeJuan is – I mean, think about it.

Okay, last year Kevin McCuller made the third team in the Big 12. He averaged 11.7 rebounds per game with great defense, right? Nobody else is really doing that for KU. You know what I mean? Like KJ is averaging a bit more points, but he's averaging less rebounds. You know, assist numbers are similar. Defense isn't as good as Kevin's was last year. Furphy, you could make the argument of how he's played in Big 12 only play.

Maybe he could find his way on there, but I don't know. Are you willing to say Furphy is KU's third best player? Maybe. I'd be open to it. And then DeJuan Harris just doesn't have the numbers to do it, and there's more competition now in the Big 12 with the extra teams in there that there's more good players. So I think realistically, you're used to seeing Kansas players littered

throughout all the lists. I don't know if that's going to happen this year just because of some of those excellent ones. Now, I will say I would expect DeJuan and KJ, Furphy probably too, to at least get like honorable mention nods. But I don't know that one will end up on one of those second or third teams uh but i think the most improved player one is is certainly interesting and there's as always going to be like you know great candidates uh across the country or i mean

across the conference and um what the big 12 has to offer and like i don't know there are a lot of players who it's going to be a much easier case to make, I guess I would say, in the Big 12 because it's easy to just like, okay, you averaged six points per game last year, now you're at 15. Like Cam Carter, for instance. Cam Carter, Kansas State, goes from averaging like six points per game to averaging 15 points per game. Tamin Lipsy goes from being like a solid starter for Iowa State last year as a true freshman to being one of the, I don't know,

five best players in the league this year, right? Those are great arguments that you can have for some of these other players. You could, I don't know, maybe argue for a couple of guys like on BYU or I'm trying to think who else is that like breakout years. I mean, Dylan Mitchell has been a little bit better, but I don't know if we're quite willing to go that far. Pop Isaacs has seen some of his numbers go up and everything. So like there's some other good candidates you can have. But I think both Furphy and KJ deserve at least, you know, I don't know. I guess this is another one where it kind of depends how you view the award.

With the most improved, it doesn't necessarily say, but it seems like it's almost implied to the voters most improved from last year to this year. Maybe that's the intention of the award. I just view it as like, okay, the term most improved. And why does most improved have to go from one season to the next? In the case of KJ, I'll make that argument in a second here. But with Johnny Furphy, I think you could make that argument of most improved over the course of a season. If you look at where Johnny Furphy was on day one for Kansas, yes, I know he did some good things in his first game, and there was still hype about what he could bring to the table, but he was a guy who was playing 5, 10, 15 minutes game to game

through the first two months of the season. To go from that to now, you can make the argument that he is one of KU's three best players three most impactful players most important players that he has opened up things for this team in a very real way when he's been in the starting lineup I mean the vast improvement of both him the numbers he's had from big 12 play versus non-con play and what it's done for the team I think warrants him being in the discussion here from just the level of improvement from the start of the year to now where we are. I think KJ Adams deserves at least recognition for this too, even though

he just won it last year. I know that sounds crazy to be like you were most improved back-to-back years. And it would be possible if like a player went went from three points per game to 12 points per game and then the next year to 20. KJ's not doing that. The stats aren't that different from last year, but they are still better. He's up about 1.6 points per game from last year to this year. He's up 0.2 rebounds. He's up almost double the amount of assists at 1.4 assists more per game. He's up about 0.4 steals per game.

The percentages are basically equal to where they were last year. But when you add in him having to play a different position, having to play a position where it's maybe not the most ideal fit on a today's day and age roster, basically playing two bigs next to each other, where he had to adjust because KU brought in an all-American level big man he had to play a different position he had to get more comfortable passing out of the high post he had to get more comfortable shooting that push shot and shooting

that elbow and mid-range and free throw line jump shot and he did all of those things and I think that deserves credit for the amount of improvement. You don't see, like a lot of times you do see players who have to change positions or change their role on a specific team, and it just goes very, very poorly or it becomes a disaster. And he has sacrificed in a lot of ways and been able to make that work. I'm not necessarily saying he should win the award, but I definitely think he deserves some credit, just as Johnny Furphy did, and at least some acknowledgement

of both those things. Let's finish up with some KU women's basketball talk on this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. First, we were brought to you by FanDuel Sportsbook. Get buckets with your first bet on FanDuel, America's number one sportsbook, because right now, new customers get $150 in bonus bets with any winning $5 bet. That's 150 bucks.

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Who's going to win the national championship. Cut down the final nets at the end of the season. Just visit fan duel.com slash locked on. Shoot your shot. FanDuel, official sportsbook partner of the NBA and our Locked On Network. Finishing things up, wanted to touch a little on KU women's basketball. So I mentioned recording this on Monday. It's going to be airing on Wednesday.

And KU actually, women's has another game Wednesday night. They're going to be at number on Wednesday. And KU actually wins, has another game Wednesday night. They're going to be at number 24, Baylor. They beat Baylor earlier this season. That would be a huge win for them if they could get a sweep. And Kansas has – okay, so the non-con was a bit troublesome. They lost games at Penn State, who turned out to be a really good team. They lost at Texas A&M. And you had a couple losses in there that combined with the, although they were competitive losses to good teams of Virginia Tech and UConn,

put you in a tough situation through non-con. Then you start conference play. You lose by 25 at home to West Virginia. You lose by eight at Iowa State. You lose by nine at Texas Tech. You're 0-3 in conference play. And you are hitting a crossroads. But from there, they have started to figure things out.

They have that 21-point win over Baylor, who was ranked fourth at the time, six-point win over Oklahoma State. There was a couple losses in there to Texas and Kansas State, who are top 15 teams in the country. Then you have now won six of your last seven by beating Iowa State, close loss at Oklahoma, and then five straight now with winning over BYU by 14 at TCU by seven versus versus Houston by 17, versus Cincinnati by 15, and most recently at BYU by eight.

And what that has done is it has turned you back into a team that has an opportunity to make the NCAA tournament. Kansas is sitting 15-10 on the season, 8-6 in conference play, and right now on ESPN's latest Women's College Basketball Bracketology, which I believe was last done on Friday. So I don't know if it takes into account Saturday's game. So maybe KU is in. Either way, they're on the bubble.

It had them as one of the first four out. So basically view them as they're right on the bubble right now. But the fact they've won these five-strike games, which were all games against teams below 500 in Big 12 play coming into the games, which were all games against teams below 500 in a big 12 play coming into the games. It was an opportunity for them and they took full advantage of the opportunity. They, they accomplished what they needed to do. And now that has set them up that these last four games, it's a tough last four games for them as there's really just one game that you kind of view as a gimme. They're going to be at Baylor. Then you have a home matchup with Kansas state at UCF. That's kind of the one gimme. And versus Oklahoma.

If you can go 2-2 in that stretch, put you at 17-12, and then you can win at least one Big 12 tournament game, I think there's going to be a solid chance you could make it on the right side of the bubble. I think realistically, the way I view it, if Kansas can win four more games, combination of regular season and the Big 12 tournament tournament i think they should be seeing their name in the ncaa tournament and that's a cool turnaround from where they were after where you know things kind of started out early in the season and they were still gelling and figuring out the bench and some of the other things that they were doing um to now having a real opportunity

to make it in and i think because of the way that they're playing right now because they're playing much better basketball because they do have a veteran laden team because they have gone deep you know winning the nit last year and winning an NCAA tournament game the year before even if they can just get in by the skin of their teeth and they can just get like a 10 seed or an 11 seed they become a dangerous team in an NCAA tournament bracket you got to make their first but they took advantage of those five straight games that they were going to have a real opportunity to win. And they did now go out and get two of the next four or three of the next four and feel good about where you're at for the NCAA tournament.

I thought it over this episode of Locked on Jayhawks. We'll be back tomorrow with an episode with Nick Schwert. We'll have a KU Texas preview later this week as well. Thanks for joining us on LOJ. See you next time.