James Harden : Pac-10 Freshman Of The Year

2007-8 PAC-10 Freshman of the Year 

When considering that honor you think of highly touted PAC-10 rookies Jerryd Bayless, O.J. Mayo, Kevin Love. Well, I'm here to tell you none of the above are the PAC-10's Rookie of the Year. The conference Rookie of the Year is..... drum roll please…….. James Harden.

Consider these facts: 

               FG %      3PT %   FT%    RPG    APG       PPG      SPG      T.O.

Harden     52.6       41.3      74.4     5.2     2.8      18.0      1.9        2.5

Bayless    47.8       43.3      83.3     4.4     2.9        21       1           3.2

Love        58.3       36.6      74        11      1.8        17        .7         2

Mayo       44.1       38.4      78.6     4.5      2.9      20.1      1.5        3.8

No disrespect to Jerryd, Kevin, and O.J., but the Artesia grad is putting the ASU program back on the mainstream radar and possibly in NCAA tournament contention.

Not since Ike Diogu’s time as a Sun Devil, has ASU been this close to a berth.

Harden has helped them to rebound from a terrible season last year, in which Arizona State lost a school record 15 straight. Harden’s 25 points in an Overtime win against then ranked #7 Stanford recently has to boost his cause.

The left hander is averaging 18.0 PPG, 1.9 SPG, and 5.2 RPG. Plus, the kid is only a astonishing 18 years old and not eligible for the NBA Draft which requires the participant to be at least 19 years of age.

That means he will have to continue to put in work for ASU and make the Pac-10 a better conference than what it already is for years to come.