LAWRENCE, Kansas – Andrew Wiggins is the face of Canada in college basketball. Kansas’ super publicized 6-8 freshman has already told the world he will only stay in school for a year before leaving for the NBA draft and the Toronto Raptors are reportedly salivating at the idea of drafting him with their first round pick.
When Wiggins reclassified from a high school junior to a senior last year at Huntington, W. Va. Prep so he could escalate his development, he was considered the best prospect in the Class of 2013. But even though he is averaging 16 points and 6 rebounds for a rapidly
improving team that is team steaming through the Big 12 and has the look of a No. 1 seed, there is no way he can live up to expectations. And people insist on throwing it back in his face.
Wiggins scored 17 points as the eighth ranked Jayhawks defeated Baylor on ESPN Big Monday, grabbed six rebounds, got to the line 12 times and held fellow Canadian Brady Heslip, who torched Kansas for 4 threes in the first half scoreless for the first 13 minutes when the eighth-ranked Jayhawks–coming off an emotional, technical foul laced win over Oklahoma State– opened the game up. But Wiggins still hasn’t had that wow, break out game that leaves fans at Allen Field House gasping for breath and blown away from watching him the way they were a couple years back when Kevin Durant of Texas visited campus.
“First of I watched a high school game with one of our recruits on Martin Luther King Day and the way the recruiting services talked the kid up, comparing him to Amare Stoudamire, it’s just a different world that the kids go through with
the hype.”
The player Self was referring to was 6-9 Cliff Alexander of Curie High in Chicago, who played for the U.S. U18 3 x3 world championships in Jakarta and will represent the United States in the annual Nike Hoops Summit, which is
taking the place of the McDonald’s All America game at the premier high school event in this country.
He will be the next big thing at Kansas after Wiggins and 7-0 freshman center Joel Embiid leave for the NBA. Embiid, an African import who has only played two years of organized basketball in the states, declare for the draft. Embiid will likely
be the first pick in the draft. Wiggins would also go in the lottery based on potential, but will enter the next level with more questions because this is his first year playing at the guard spot and he is not totally comfortable there yet.
“I think in a lot of :ways he’s handled it beautifully in how he’s deflected the hype,” Self said. “But in some ways he hasn’t understood and maybe we haven’t done a great job of explaining it to him, because of all the media hype and
everything, if you don’t produce you’re going to be the most talked about person. If you do produce, it’s expected. So it’s basically a no win perspective.
“Because there’s no way he was going to live up to the hype.
“So, I think when you look across America, Ben MacLemore had a heckava first year and Andrew’s stats are the same. The kid averages 16 and if he makes layups holding onto balls, it would easily be 18-19, 20. I think he’s done well,
but there’s another step he can take. He leaves me wanting more.
“So when people say certain things, I can’t be upset when they’re saying them, because he leaves me wanting more too.”
Wiggins epitomizes this Kansas team, which is really starting to go on. The Jayhawks had four losses entering Big 12 play, but they had been on a roll, beating four ranked conference opponents to take control of this league. Kansas’
RPI is first in the country and if they continue to roll in a league that has six Top 25 team, we could be looking at a No. 1 seed, playing in St. Louis and Memphis. .
This has been one of Self’s best coaching jobs ever primarily because this is his most inexperienced team, even younger than the 2006 team. Sophomore forward Perry Ellis– the veteran of the team– only averaged 13 minutes a game
and junior point guard Nadir Tharp was a
deep backup on last year’s regional team.
Wiggins is a work in progress.
“He’s so nice,” Self said. “I don’t know if he thinks about it, but he’s everybody’s Super Bowl. We can tell him that but I don’t know if he feels that yet.”
