Updated Rankings for College Basketball's Player of the Year in 2014-15 Season

The Player of the Year race is still a two-man contest, as it has been for some time. It's Frank Kaminsky or Jahlil Okafor. Most voters have probably made up their minds already, and only one guy falling off big time—not likely—would change anyone's stance.

But what is still very much up in the air is the race to be a first-team All-American. It's between eight guys, and I have them in the top eight spots in these rankings. My current first team, obviously, would be the top five.

I could be swayed, however, over these last few weeks of the season. How the teams of these respective stars perform could matter just as much as how they do individually. Team success and trying to quantify a player's value to that success without just comparing numbers are more important this season—thanks John Calipari—than any other.

10. Darrun Hilliard, Villanova

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Previous rank: Unranked

Kentucky, Villanova and Virginia are all similar in that they have had such great seasons that they deserve someone to get postseason accolades, but they have so much balance that no one has the numbers that really stick out.

Well, Darrun Hilliard is doing his best to make a late-season push for an All-American spot. He has been on fire since he dropped 31 points at Butler on Valentine's Day. He's averaging 22.5 over his last four games and has made 21 of his last 38 threes.

For some reason, many are sleeping on the Wildcats, but here's a reminder that they're 26-2 and running away with the conference title in the third-best league in the country. They deserve some love, and so does Hilliard.

9. Karl-Anthony Towns, Kentucky

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Previous rank: 7

Two.

That's the number of shots Karl-Anthony Towns has missed in the last four games. Two! Granted, he's only taken 18 during that stretch, but those attempts are going to go up once the NCAA tournament starts.

Imagine what Towns would do if he got normal star treatment—read: more minutes and shots—and didn't play for a team with a gazillion pros.

What Towns has proved is that when he gets the rock, he is one of the best players in the country, and let's not forget he's also the best shot-blocker on a historically dominant defense.

Here's another crazy stat for you: He's closing in on having more blocks (66) than missed shots (76) this season. If he were to stay on his recent four-game pace—that's 4.5 blocks for every missed shot—he'd get there by the end of the season.

8. Delon Wright, Utah

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Previous rank: 5

Utah has been in a bit of a scoring funk and has been a little up and down lately. The Utes are 8-2 in their last 10 games after starting 14-3, and Delon Wright has had a slight drop-off in production.

Wright is averaging 12.9 points over those 10 games and shooting 48.3 percent from the field. His assist numbers (4.6 per game over the last 10) are down a tick as well. These are still solid numbers for a point guard, but a month ago Wright would have been a first-team All-American, and now he has some work to get back in that spot.

A killer performance and a win Saturday against Arizona would obviously go a long way.

7. Seth Tuttle, Northern Iowa

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Previous rank: 8

I'll be in attendance Saturday at Wichita State and ready to take in the Seth Tuttle experience.

Tuttle dominated last time out against the Shockers—29 points on just 13 shots—and he's pretty much been the mid-major Frank Kaminsky this year. He shoots 45.9 percent outside the arc and 65.6 percent inside it, and oh yeah, he also dishes out 3.2 assists per game.

The Panthers aren't quite at the level of 2013-14 Wichita State, but they're also not that far from being undefeated, suffering just an overtime loss at VCU and a road hiccup at Evansville. If they get a win Saturday inside a Koch Arena that will be going bonkers with College GameDay in the house, no one will be able to question the legitimacy of Tuttle and the Panthers.

6. Kyle Wiltjer, Gonzaga

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Previous rank: 6

Kyle Wiltjer was having a nice season over the first few months of the year, and it was a great story to go from a role guy at Kentucky to the star at Gonzaga. Then February hit. And Wiltjer decided he was taking this story to new levels.

By now, you've probably heard about his 45 points last week at Pacific. The Gonzaga haters will probably make the same old quality-of-competition argument when it comes to how impressive those 45 points were, but I don't care who you are playing—if you drop 45 on any Division I defense, that's some legit bucket-getting.

So, about February...Wiltjer is averaging 21.6 points and making 54.6 of his three-pointers this month. And even you take away that 45-point game, he's still averaging 17.7 points and shooting 47.8 percent from deep for the month.

5. D'Angelo Russell, Ohio State

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Previous rank: 4

I'm not usually a fan of comparing college guys with pros, but I just finished a long feature on D'Angelo Russell that compared him to James Harden and Stephen Curry. No pressure, huh?

It's probably unfair to anyone to get compared to two of the best guards in the world, but Russell is posting numbers similar to those two as freshmen (18.7 points, 5.7 rebounds and 5.4 assists per game, 42.7 percent shooting from three). If you really watch him, he does have some pieces of their game in his arsenal.

No one really realized how good those two were at the time, so if you have not already, take the time to watch Russell over this last month of the season. Guys who can do the things he can do at such a young age don't come along often.

4. Willie Cauley-Stein, Kentucky

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Previous rank: Unranked

It's going to be interesting to see what the SEC does with its Player of the Year considering the league has a guy on its second-best team putting up great offensive stats—Arkansas big man Bobby Portis—and a bunch of guys at Kentucky who don't have statistics that jump off the page.

Portis would be a fine Player of the Year choice, but if Kentucky ends up going undefeated, is there any possible way the league POY and also the national All-American teams cannot have a Wildcat on them?

I say no. And the perfect man to represent Kentucky and its "sacrifice your numbers while we kick everyone's butt" approach is Willie Cauley-Stein.

Numbers would never be able to quantify his value—even if the platoon didn't exist—but I found one that shows how ridiculous a talent he is on the defensive end. Cauley-Stein ranks 116th in steals percentage, per kenpom.com. Now kenpom's leaderboards only show the top 100, so I cannot say this for certain, but I'm going to assume there isn't another 7-footer from 101-114. There are only two players in the top 100 taller than 6'8", and 6'10" is the tallest on the list.

Cauley-Stein, at 7'0", leads Kentucky in steals. The dude is a freak. And an All-American.

3. Jerian Grant, Notre Dame

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Previous rank: 3

Notre Dame has already doubled its ACC wins from a year ago and trails Duke by just half a game for second place in the ACC standings.

That's important to note whenever you talk about Jerian Grant. Any debate about who is the most valuable guy to his team in the country begins and ends with the difference between last year's Irish without Grant and this year's with him.

The Irish have to be kicking themselves for losing to Syracuse at home this past week, but it was kind of a fluke that a team that usually shoots it great from beyond the arc went 3-of-22.

Grant didn't help with his shooting—he missed all six of his three-point attempts—but much of his value comes from how he makes others better. He had nine assists in that game and has 30 dimes over the last three contests.

2. Jahlil Okafor, Duke

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Previous rank: 2

Jahlil Okafor returned from an ankle injury to score 30 points and play 37 minutes Wednesday at Virginia Tech. I'm not sure which is more impressive—the points or the minutes.

The win was so Duke. Good offense. Lousy defense. Dominant Okafor on the blocks. And great execution down the stretch to win the game.

There's reason to worry about Duke in March because of that defense, and that's been the one reason I have a hard time picking Okafor over Frank Kaminsky for Player of the Year. Defense should matter. But as well as Duke can score the ball, as dominant as Okafor is on the blocks and as well as this team executes down the stretch of games, maybe we should just appreciate Okafor and his Blue Devils for their beautiful offense and not stress over their parting-of-the-sea D.

1. Frank Kaminsky, Wisconsin

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Previous rank: 1

Wisconsin's loss at Maryland was the first loss with Frank Kaminsky in the lineup since Duke.

This one really wasn't on him. He was a little off, but he still managed to score 18 points. The loss had more to do with Wisconsin's inability to keep Dez Wells out of the paint, and the Badgers' perimeter D isn't great.

So why does Kaminsky get a pass for that, while Okafor doesn't? Well, Okafor is part of the problem—he really struggles in ball-screen situations—and Wisconsin's issues have little to do with Kaminsky.

As long as Wisconsin doesn't totally fall off down the stretch and Kaminsky keeps consistently performing like he has, he'll get my vote.

All statistics are current as of February 26.