2024-25 Men's College Basketball Freshman of the Year Rankings
If the person tasked with etching the winner's name onto the Wayman Tisdale National Freshman of the Year Award hasn't already started working on "Cooper Flagg," he or she can feel free to do so.
National Player of the Year is still very much up in the air between Flagg and Auburn's fifth-year senior Johni Broome, but they might as well officially declare the freshman race over. No one is catching Flagg.
That's not for lack of quality competition, though. There are about a dozen players in this year's class who would've at least given Reed Sheppard a run for his money last season. They've just had the misfortune of trying to contend with a star on the level of a Zion Williamson, Anthony Davis or Kevin Durant.
We'll continue to rank the top 10 candidates, though, in case you're curious what an all-freshman All-American team might look like, or simply interested in hearing a college basketball take on what are mostly soon-to-be lottery picks.
Contrary to consideration for National Player of the Year trophies like the Wooden Award, one needn't play for a title contender to have a real shot at winning this one. Oklahoma was a No. 10 seed when Trae Young was named the National Freshman of the Year in 2018, and LSU missing the tournament altogether didn't keep Ben Simmons from winning in 2016.
Team success is much more of a potential bonus than a prerequisite, helping the likes of Flagg and Tahaad Pettiford, more so than hurting Rutgers' dynamic duo or guys playing for teams on the bubble.
Statistics are current through the start of play Wednesday, Feb. 19.
Honorable mentions (in alphabetical order): Egor Demin, Jeremiah Fears, Blake Harper, Tomislav Ivisic, Kon Knueppel, John Mobley Jr., Jase Richardson, Thomas Sorber
10. Asa Newell, Georgia
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Season Stats: 15.3 PPG, 6.8 RPG, 1.2 SPG, 1.1 BPG, 27% 3PT
Previous Rank: No. 10
Life in the SEC has derailed Georgia's NCAA tournament prospects. The Bulldogs have lost eight of their last 10 games, and even the two wins (vs. LSU and vs. South Carolina) did nothing to actually help their case for a bid. At this point, they are on the outside looking in at the projected field.
Don't blame Asa Newell, though.
The soon-to-be lottery pick has scored at least 16 points in seven of those last 10 games, shooting 61 percent inside the arc, 27 percent beyond it and 83 percent from the free-throw line. He also tallied a double-double in the loss to Auburn, and eclipsed 20 points for the first time in 25 games in his last time out against Missouri. (Newell went for 23 points, 10 rebounds, three blocks and two assists in that one.)
He did have a rough night in the recent loss to Texas A&M, managing just six points and five rebounds in a game where the Bulldogs were without two key veterans, playing on the road against an excellent defense. It would've been wonderful to watch him take over that game as Georgia went about 12 minutes without making a single field goal, but it hardly seems worth worrying about that outlier.
Can he propel the Bulldogs to a big win in the next week, though? They get Auburn on Saturday and Florida on Tuesday. And if they lose both, that's likely the final straw that will keep this star out of the dance.
9. Tahaad Pettiford, Auburn
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Season Stats: 11.6 PPG, 2.6 APG, 1.8 RPG, 1.1 SPG, 40% 3PT
Previous Rank: No. 6
Tahaad Pettiford is the only freshman in our top 10 averaging fewer than 15 points per game.
Of course, at 21.5 minutes per game as a strong candidate for national sixth man of the year, he's also getting the least amount of playing time by far, and his per-40 scoring average (21.6) is right on par with those of Asa Newell (21.3) and Derik Queen (21.7).
Since opening the season with a zero-point, five-foul dud in Auburn's blowout of Vermont, Pettiford has made at least one three-pointer in 23 of his last 24 games, usually several of them and usually with a handful of assists.
He did what he could in that recent loss to Florida, going for 14 points and three assists in 25 minutes played. He also had 13 points in 23 minutes in that massive win over Alabama, and played a key role in making Mark Sears work for every single inch of space he could get in that game.
Save for when he's hitting dagger triples, Pettiford sometimes gets overlooked in this dominant rotation where six Tigers are averaging better than 10 points per game. Make no mistake about it, though, this freshman is a major piece of the puzzle for what has been one of the best teams in recent memory.
8. Liam McNeeley, Connecticut
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Season Stats: 15.4 PPG, 6.6 RPG, 2.3 APG, 37% 3PT
Previous Rank: Honorable Mention
For a while there, we simply had to remove Liam McNeeley from the top 10. He had missed too many games in a row while recovering from his ankle sprain, and there were just too many freshmen playing at a level worthy of recognition here.
Since returning to action two weeks ago, though, McNeeley has been awesome for the Huskies.
He went for 18 and 11 against an outstanding St. John's defense in his first game in more than a month. And then he absolutely exploded for 38 points at Creighton, scoring more than half of UConn's points in that 70-66 victory.
McNeeley's off day against Seton Hall played a big part in UConn suffering that embarrassing loss, but then he played with all sorts of killer instinct in Tuesday night's come-from-behind win over Villanova. As the Huskies finished that game on a 17-4 run, he scored 11 of his 20 points and dropped the dime to Tarris Reed Jr. for what was effectively the game-sealing bucket in the closing seconds.
Not only is he their best player, but he brings the spark that had been missing for a while. Without him, UConn probably rolls over and dies in that game against Villanova. Instead, McNeeley put the team on his back and kept them from suffering a loss that would have pushed them down to the bubble.
7. Derik Queen, Maryland
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Season Stats: 16.0 PPG, 8.8 RPG, 2.1 APG, 1.1 SPG, 1.0 BPG
Previous Rank: No. 9
With approximately one million NBA scouts in Maryland's Xfinity Center, Derik Queen and the Terrapins welcomed in Rutgers' dynamic duo of Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey two weekends ago.
While it's unfortunate that Bailey clearly was not at full strength with some sort of illness, those two Scarlet Knights combined for 24 points, eight rebounds and seven assists while Queen went off for 29, 15 and five, respectively, in a performance for the ages.
It was only Queen's seventh double-double of the season, but he subsequently added two more in the wins over Nebraska (24 and 11) and Iowa (18 and 13).
He's a certified wrecking ball in the paint, making nearly 60 percent of his two-point attempts, owning the glass and getting to the charity stripe at one of the highest rates in the Big Ten, now averaging 5.6 attempts per game and making 76 percent of them.
And after trying to hit some threes early in the year, Queen has pretty well abandoned the perimeter game with just two attempts in his last nine games. That might put a bit of a glass ceiling on his draft night potential, but his willingness to embrace what he does best has probably raised the ceiling of what Maryland could accomplish in the NCAA tournament.
6. Kasparas Jakucionis, Illinois
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Season Stats: 15.6 PPG, 5.5 RPG, 4.8 APG, 1.0 SPG, 34% 3PT
Previous Rank: No. 3
No matter who landed at No. 6, it was going to feel unduly harsh. It's really a situation where Cooper Flagg is the clear No. 1, followed by a quintet of 2A/2B/2C/2D/2E.
However, they had to be placed in some order, and Kasparas Jakucionis simply hasn't been making the same impact in February that he did in the first few months of the season.
In fact, he just had his worst game of the season in Tuesday's 21-point loss to Wisconsin, going for six points with no assists and seven turnovers.
It was the third time this month that KJ posted an O-rating below 80, which is something he had done only once in his first 19 games.
Of course, high-usage freshmen hitting the proverbial wall in February is hardly a phenomenon unique to Jakucionis. And if he snaps out of it for a gem this Saturday in Madison Square Garden against Flagg and the Blue Devils, everyone would forget about the past couple of weeks as though they were hit by the neuralyzer from Men In Black.
For now, though, he slips to the bottom of this second tier, as Illinois tries to figure out whether or not it is a legitimate contender.
4/5. Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey, Rutgers
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Dylan Harper Season Stats: 18.5 PPG, 4.7 RPG, 4.0 APG, 1.1 SPG, 32% 3PT (Previous Rank: No. 7)
Ace Bailey Season Stats: 18.6 PPG, 7.4 RPG, 1.3 BPG, 1.2 APG, 1.0 SPG, 37% 3PT (Previous Rank: No. 2)
Truth be told, I have given up on trying to figure out which member of this dynamic duo has actually been the better college basketball freshman and have moved on to mourning the memory of what could have been for this Rutgers team. (Forced to choose, though, we'll go Harper at No. 5 and Bailey at No. 4.)
Bailey missed the first couple of games with an injury and didn't start really hitting his stride until mid-to-late December, after which Harper's play was compromised for a month between being both sick and injured. And after they played one game together at something close to full strength (beating Illinois somewhat convincingly), then Bailey got sick and hasn't looked right over the past few games.
Even though Rutgers is 12-14 overall and 5-10 in league play, it still legitimately feels like the Scarlet Knights could win the Big Ten tournament if both of these stars are good to go at near 100 percent.
At any rate, when both Harper and Bailey play and post an O-rating of 100 or better, Rutgers is 6-2 with wins over Illinois, UCLA and Nebraska, as well as close calls against both Alabama and Texas A&M.
It just stinks for the good of the entire sport that we've only seen eight such games in 26 tries. Either one of those stars could have made a run at Cooper Flagg for Freshman of the Year, and both will be quite the consolation prize for two NBA teams who finish in the Nos. 2-5 range of the draft lottery.
3. Tre Johnson, Texas
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Season Stats: 19.8 PPG, 3.2 RPG, 2.6 APG, 37% 3PT
Previous Rank: No. 5
How much does/should being fun to watch factor into a Player of the Year type of race?
Because Tre Johnson is definitely at or darn near the top of that list, playing with copious amounts of the right kind of swagger.
By 'right kind' we mean there's a fine line between the Marshall Henderson / Chad Baker-Mazara type of swagger where the player loves telling specific people how good he is, and then the Kobe Bryant type of swagger where the player loves telling the world in general how good he is.
And when Johnson gets on a heater like he did in the come-from-behind, season-saving wins over Texas A&M and Kentucky in the past month, there sure is a lot of the latter shining through.
Johnson scored what was then a career-high 30 against the Aggies, 24 of those in the second half. And he took it one step further against the Wildcats, exploding for 32 in that one.
We did somewhat predict that latter performance two weeks ago, saying in our previous FOY rankings: "Before our next update in mid-February, Johnson will get back-to-back games against Alabama and Kentucky—marquee matchups with up-tempo teams, the latter of which is having a difficult time stopping anything on defense these days." (He also had 24 against Alabama, though Texas lost that one 103-80.)
Johnson (19.79 PPG) is now ever so slightly ahead of Cooper Flagg (19.65 PPG) for the title of top-scoring freshman in the country. And it's going to be up to him to get this bubble team into the dance.
2. VJ Edgecombe, Baylor
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Season Stats: 15.0 PPG, 5.2 RPG, 3.3 APG, 2.1 SPG, 36% 3PT
Previous Rank: No. 4
For the really special freshman talents, there often comes a point in the season where the proverbial light comes on and the player realizes, "Oh, damn, these dudes cannot guard me."
For Cooper Flagg, Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey, that light was on long before they stepped on campus. But for VJ Edgecombe, that light is less of an eternal flame and more of a candle flickering in the wind, but it's gaining strength.
In January, it was on for a while, as Edgecombe just took whatever he wanted against the likes of Kansas State, Utah and BYU. However, he then settled back into more of a passive role in the first half of February.
In Monday's showdown with Arizona, though, that light was shining brightly as Edgecombe went into "takeover" mode time and again, routinely driving by Caleb Love like he wasn't even there and either getting to the rim, the foul line or both. It wasn't enough for a win, but he finished that one with 24 points and easily could've had at least a dozen more if he had spent the entire game playing with that type of fire and confidence.
It's all very reminiscent of Jayson Tatum's lone season at Duke, where it felt like we had all figured out he needed to be "the guy" for that team about two months before he realized it, but he did eventually get there a couple weeks before the tournament began.
1. Cooper Flagg, Duke
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Season Stats: 19.7 PPG, 7.7 RPG, 4.0 APG, 1.6 SPG, 1.2 BPG, 37% 3PT
Previous Rank: No. 1
I have written either a National Player of the Year rankings or a National Freshman of the Year rankings on a weekly basis since early December, which means an every-seven-days reassessment of what Cooper Flagg has been up to.
You would think after a while that it gets a bit old, but it really doesn't, because Flagg always seems to be coming off of some incredible performance.
Even in the Feb. 8 loss to Clemson, in which Flagg posted a sub-100 O-rating for the only time since before Christmas, the super frosh almost willed the Blue Devils to victory with a push over the final six minutes that rivaled Michael Jordan's fabled flu game.
After a bit of rest and recovery, Flagg proceeded to dominate his next three games, averaging 21.0 points, 8.0 rebounds, 3.7 assists and 2.3 steals as Duke destroyed Cal, Stanford and Virginia. He set a new career high with 14 boards against the Cavaliers, and he didn't commit a single turnover in either of his past two games.
Over his last 18 games, Flagg is shooting 50.8 percent from the field, 42.3 percent from three-point range and 86.0 percent from the free-throw line, which is ludicrous efficiency from a player doing so much heavy lifting.
Trey Murphy was in the 50/40/90 club for Virginia in 2020-21, but on 7.6 shots per game instead of 13.6, and while not exactly leading his team in each of rebounds, assists, blocks and steals like Flagg does. But that's just how dominant Flagg has been for more than two months at this point.
