THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
THURSDAY, APRIL 30, 2015
PAGE 7A
THE DAILY DEBATE
Who should advance in #FaceoftheStreak?
TYSHAWN TAYLOR
When you think of legendary players for legendary programs,you don't think of one-and-done guys.You think about players who were a part of a program for a while.
You think about a player who grew up and matured in his four years playing college basketball. You think about a player who got better and improved his game as the years went on.
For Kansas, you think of Tyshawn Taylor.
Taylor started for coach Bill Self for four years, from 2008- 2012. From Taylor's sophomore year on, he averaged 28 minutes per game. He totaled 1,580 points during his career, which ranks 37th in Big 12 history.
Taylor also ranks No.1 on the Big 12 leaderboards in games played with 146 and 11th in minutes played with 3,111.The only possible way to achieve
these milestones is to stay in school and play for four years.
While at Kansas, Taylor was on four Big 12 regular season championship teams, including a run to the national championship game during his senior season in 2012. Taylor dramatically improved during his senior year as he went on to average 16.6 points and 4.8 assists per game.
Although Taylor wasn't always the steadiest hand and often made Self and the rest of the Jayhawk faithful a little nervous when holding the ball, he still had a 1.5 assist-turnover ratio throughout his career at Kansas. Andrew Wiggins may not have played point guard, but his ratio was a much less impressive .68.
Taylor received All-Big 12 rookie honors as he averaged 9.7 points and three assists in his first year in Lawrence. He received All-Big 12 first team honors in 2012 as well as being named a third-team All-American.
Taylor poured his heart and soul into the program at Kansas, working and bleeding in the Fieldhouse for four years. The same simply cannot be said for a player who leaves after their freshman year.
Wiggins may have put together one of, if not the most, impressive freshman seasons Kansas has ever seen, but that's
Wiggins took 185 more shots than Taylor did during his freshman year but scored only 257 more points than Taylor. Taylor shot a much more impressive 56.1 percent from two-point range his freshman year compared to Wiggins' 49.3 percent. He also shot 20 percentage points higher from behind the three-point line than Wiggins did.
What is most important in this debate is postseason success. Arguably, Wiggins will most be remembered for his four-point performance against Stanford in Kansas' Round of 32 loss in 2014.
But Taylor's last game in a Jayhawk uniform went a bit differently. Taylor recorded 19 points, three assists and one steal in Kansas' national championship loss. This performance was coming off the heels of a 10-point, nine-assist performance in Kansas' Final Four victory against Ohio State.
To me, the question is simple: Twenty-nine points and 12 assists in the two games that matter most, or a four-point performance in a loss during the first weekend of the tournament?
The answer should be even easier: Tyshawn Taylor.
Edited by Mackenzie Clark
ANDREW WIGGINS
Only playing a year for the Jayhawks shouldn't prevent
In 35 games in crimson and blue, Wiggins averaged 17.1 points and 5.9 rebounds per game. Wiggins came into the college scene as the No.1 recruit in the nation and didn't disappoint, putting up numbers that earned him the No.1 selection in the 2014 NBA draft, as well.
shouldn't prevent the phenomenal one-and-done stud Andrew Wiggins from moving on against Tyshawn Taylor. Ignoring the outrageous scoring abilities shown in his first year with the Minnesota Timberwolves in the NBA, Wiggins' sole season with the Jayhawks is one of the best Kansas has had
averaged fewer points and fewer rebounds than the freshman star.
Only in his final season with the Jayhawks did Taylor reach 16.6 points per game. In a minute per game more than Wiggins, Taylor still
Despite having a few rough games scoring the ball, including a four-point performance in the Round of 32 against Stanford, Wiggins was the most consistent scoring threat for the Jayhawks.
EAT COM
Mostly remembered in Kansas' loss against West Virginia, Wiggins made himself be respected with 41 points on 12-for-18 shooting
Rarely did Wiggins' play hurt the team, which can't be said for Taylor. Having many games with struggles taking over the ball, Taylor earned a reputation for making poor decisions with the ball. Taylor turned the ball over nearly four times per game while Wiggins only turned it over two times in the same amount of minutes.
What truly separates Wiggins from Taylor is his ability to defend both on the perimeter and in the post. On a team with Joel Embiid, Wiggins was still the best lockdown defender on the team, averaging a steal and a block per game.
During Taylor's years as a Jayhawk, he was on a team of veterans and players who had experience, while Wiggins was the centerpiece
of a young team with three starting freshmen and one senior, Tarik Black, receiving minutes. Wiggins was able to do more than Taylor with less experience.
Following another freshman stud in Ben McLemore, Wiggins put on a dunking clinic and showed athleticism that Kansas had never seen before.
"WHAT TRULY SEPARATES WIGGINS FROM TAYLOR IS HIS ABILITY TO DEFEND BOTH ON THE PERIMETER AND IN THE POST."
"From a raw, athletic ability standpoint, he can do some things that I've never had a player be able to do physically," coach Bill Self told ESPN.
In some cases, Wiggins took over games, such as his 41-point performance against West Virginia, but for the most part he was just flat-out better than everyone else on the floor, and that should be enough for him to move on to the Final Four.
Edited by Mackenzie Clark
Heeney will make an NFL team, prove his doubters wrong
CHRISTIAN HARDY
@HardyNFL
Ben Heeney will be on an NFL team before the end of the week. Then he'll make a final 53-man NFL roster. Then he'll keep proving people wrong. Heeney, the former Kansas linebacker who has entered this week's NFL Draft, has no doubt about it.
"Even if I don't get drafted, I'm not worried about it,"
Heeney said, sitting in a sofa at the Anderson Family Football Complex. "I'll still make a team."
Heeney probably won't have to worry about it, though. The 6-foot, 231-pound linebacker is expected to go in the mid-rounds. Slept on and bogged down by many media outlets through the draft process, he's trying to defeat a handful of pre-meditated stereotypes.
Some say he's too slow, too
small. Others say he'll only make a team as a try-hard linebacker. Some have put him in the same graveyard that David Beaty is trying to dig the Kansas football program from and associate him with the three-win product Kansas put on the field last year. But after running a 4.59-second 40-yard dash and coming in at the top of the charts in the 3-cone drill and 60-yard shuttle at the NFL Combine, he's shown those
showing of what he brought to the field.
Heeney's size has probably been his largest pitfall, according to draft experts. Nolan Nawrocki, who writes a book previewing the NFL draft prospects every year, wrote of Heeney, "Smallish frame with very short arms and small hands. Struggles to wrap up and secure tackles in space."
"I never left anything on the field. It was a shot in the dark every Saturday we're going out there," Heeney said. "For me and guys like JaCorey (Shepherd) to go out and play with as much as heart as we did, knowing there was slim to no chance that we're going to win the game, week in and week out, it shows a lot about our character."
stereotypes to be more than what he'll bring to a team.
"There's people that really like me, and there's people that think I'm a terrible player," Heeney said. "When I went down to Tampa Bay and visited with Lovie Smith... the first thing he asked me when I walked into his office was, 'Do you think you need to gain or lose weight?' I said, 'I think I'm good where I'm at, I don't need to gain or lose.' He said, "That's a
But Heeney is showing that the team's final record line over his time at Kansas isn't a fair
perfect answer."
Edited by Victoria Kirk
Lawrence Electronic Recycling Event
DOES IT HAVE A CORD OR BATTERY? THAT'S E-WASTE! RECYCLE IT WITH US!
A $20 recycling fee applies per CRT television 21 inches and under, and a $40 fee per CRT television over 27 inches/all big screen televisions/all console televisions. Cash or check only. No charge for other electronics.
Saturday, May 2, 2015 9:00am to 1:00pm
City of Lawrence PUBLIC WORKS
KU Park & Ride, East Parking Lot Clinton Pkwy & Crestline Drive
For further information call 832-3030 or visit www.LawrenceRecycles.org.
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William Warby