The Most Mind-Boggling Stats in College Basketball This Season

As the saying goes, numbers never lie. But that doesn't mean the stories they tell aren't sometimes difficult to believe.

College basketball players and teams are producing some incredibly surprising stats this season, some of which would set records or at least set benchmarks for recent play. There are still a few weeks left in the 2016-17 season, making it possible that some (or all) of these numbers could slip back to a more believable range, but before we let that happen it's time to shed some light on them.

Below are a handful of the most dumbfounding figures from the current college basketball season based on action through Friday's games.

Notre Dame and Villanova's Foul Shooting

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The NCAA record for team free-throw percentage is 82.2, set by Harvard in 1983-84 when the Crimson made 535 of 651 foul shots during a 15-11 season. Since then only a handful of schools have come close to that mark by shooting 80 percent or better from the line, with Connecticut's 79.3 percent the best rate from last season.

Notre Dame and Villanova are both above the 80 percent threshold as March approaches, with the Fighting Irish within reach of Harvard's mark. The Irish are shooting 81.6 percent (391-of-479) while Villanova is at 80 percent (429-of-536).

Defending national champion Villanova, which ranked second in the nation in 2015-16 at 78.2 percent, has made at least 90 percent of its free throws in eight games this season. That includes going 20-of-22 from the line in an eight-point December win over Notre Dame, a game that saw the Irish make all six of their foul shots.

Notre Dame has one of the lowest free-throw attempt rates—number of foul shots taken per field-goal attempt—in the country, which means a few really strong performances at the line down the stretch could enable it to catch Harvard. And if it's not able to win the national championship but still shoots well it could at least break Harvard's 2011 record for best free-throw percentage by a team not to win it all (80.8).

Marcus Keene's Scoring

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How long has it been since a Division I college basketball player averaged 30 points per game in a season? Twenty years, to be exact, Long Island's Charles Jones the last to do it in 1996-97 at 30.1 per game.

Enter Marcus Keene, whose generously listed 5'11”, 160-pound frame doesn't look that imposing but before you know it he's either driven past or (more likely) shot over his defender from incredibly deep. The Central Michigan junior guard is averaging 29.7 points per game after scoring 27 in Friday's loss at Toledo.

A transfer from Youngstown State who sat out the 2015-16 season, Keene has pretty much already wrapped up the national scoring title unless either he falls flat or someone else goes off in March. South Dakota State's Mike Daum is second in the country in scoring at 24.8 per game.

Make no mistake, Keene is a volume shooter, his 621 field-goal attempts is 64 more than anyone else. But he's shooting a respectable 45.1 percent overall and 36.9 percent from three-point range, and he also gets to the line eight times per game and makes 81.5 of his foul shots.

Keene has scored at least 20 points in all but four games this season, has hit the 30-point mark 15 times and has six 40-point games including 50 in a win over Miami (Ohio) in January. No other player in the country has scored 40 more than three times.

Savannah State's Three-Point Shooting Frequency

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If at first you don't succeed, try and try again. And again, and again. Heck, just never stop trying.

That's basically the message Savannah State coach Horace Broadnax has had for his Tigers players this season when it comes to attempting three-pointers. They've taken 1,070 such shots in 26 games, accounting for 59.3 percent of their field goals and far ahead of the second-most frequent three-point shooting team (Central Michigan, 52.3 percent).

Unfortunately, this approach hasn't been that successful. Savannah State shoots only 32.9 percent from three and its overall 40.6 percent field-goal rate is among the 30 worst in the country. And because the Tigers are abysmal on defense, allowing 92.8 points per game, the 84.8 points per game they score doesn't pass muster.

Savannah State is 10-16 overall and 7-6 in the MEAC, good enough for a tie for fifth in one of the nation's weakest conferences.

As three-point crazy as Savannah State has been it is still a far cry from approaching the single-season attempt record. VMI took 1,383 threes in 33 games in 2006-07.

Caleb Swanigan's 20-20 Games

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Caleb Swanigan is coming off arguably his worst game of the season, scoring 10 points with nine rebounds in a win at Penn State on Tuesday. That wouldn't be so bad for most players, but when you'd had double-doubles in 23 of the previous 27 games failing to get to double figures in both categories is quite notable.

We've come to expect nothing less this season from the 6'9”, 260-pound sophomore forward, who averages 18.6 points and 12.9 rebounds per game for Big Ten-leading Purdue. That's a major rise from the freshman numbers of 10.2 points and 8.3 rebounds for the player known as "Biggie."

Swanigan's 23 double-doubles aren't just the most in the country but also tied for the 11th-most in a season since 2010-11, and he has a shot to surpass the single-season record of 31 set by Navy's David Robinson in 1986.

He's already well ahead of the pack in terms of 20-20 games, of which he has four. No other player in the country has more than two, with Weber State's Joel Bolomboy in 2015-16 the only other player in the past seven years to have at least three.

Gonzaga's Scoring Margin in Conference Games

Gregory Bull/Associated Press

Say what you want about the overall quality of competition that unbeaten Gonzaga has faced in the West Coast Conference, you can't deny how impressive the Bulldogs have been in absolutely demolishing those opponents. Thursday night was the latest dominant performance, a 96-38 win at San Diego.

The 58-point margin of victory was Gonzaga's biggest ever against a Division I opponent and upped its conference scoring margin to 28.2 points per game. With two WCC games remaining it's almost assured of having the best league scoring margin since 1998-99, which was Duke's 24.3 average margin against the ACC that season, according to Ken Pomeroy.

"One team that Gonzaga won’t be catching in the scoring margin department is 1991 UNLV who won all 18 games against the Big West by an average margin of 29.7," Pomeroy wrote earlier this month. "Like this season’s WCC, that season’s Big West was not a great test for one of the country’s best teams."

Overall, Gonzaga is beating its opponents by 24.9 points per game, which would rank as ninth-best in Division I history. The record is 30.3, set by UCLA in 1971-72.

Monte Morris' Assist-to-Turnover Ratio

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When Monte Morris has the ball in his hands good things tend to happen, maybe more so than with any other player in Division I history. Iowa State's senior point guard won't go down as one of the greatest scorers ever, though at 16.3 points per game he is leading the team toward another NCAA tournament bid, and his 6.0 assists per game is only tied for 12th-best in the country.

But when you take into account Morris' mistakes, or the lack of them, the distinction of being college basketball's most careful ball-handler ever makes total sense.

This season Morris has dished out 162 assists against just 28 turnovers, a ratio of 5.79-to-1 that's not just a mile ahead of the competition but on track to shatter his own NCAA record. His 4.79-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio from 2013-14 is the single-season mark.

For his career Morris' ratio is 4.72-to-1, which is nearly 57 percent better than the current record of 3.01-to-1 that Wisconsin's Jordan Taylor had from 2009-12.

Dunks Allowed by Saint Mary's

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One of the most embarrassing things that can happen to a player is to get dunked on. Avoiding being "put on a poster," as it's called, often leads to defenders backing off even challenging a potential dunker for risk of looking silly.

Don't tell that to Saint Mary's, which has only yielded nine dunks all season, according to Ken Pomeroy. That accounts for just 1.89 percent of the 477 two-point field goals the Gaels have allowed in 28 games.

Saint Mary's has a pretty good defense, allowing 40.9 percent shooting and 56.1 points per game but has blocked just 88 shots. Center Jock Landale has 33 blocks, but the 6'11” junior is also adept at altering shots, which in his case also means making dunking not much of an option.

To put Saint Mary's "dunk defense" in perspective, look at the other end of the spectrum. Arizona State is the most dunked-on team in the country, having had it happen 88 times including six in Thursday's home loss to UCLA.

Total Triple-Doubles Recorded

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NC State's Dennis Smith is one of two players in the country with multiple triple-doubles this season.

NBA star Russell Westbrook is making the triple-double seem like a run-of-the-mill feat but in the college game it's still a relatively rare accomplishment. Yet this season has the potential to produce the most triple-doubles in Division I history.

Thanks to the 14 points, 13 rebounds and 10 blocks by Nicholls State's Liam Thomas and Northeastern's T.J. Williams going for 26 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists on Thursday night we're sitting at 25 triple-doubles for 2016-17. That's six short of the 31 that were recorded last season but at this point only 23 had occurred.

Also of note: 2015-16 was the final season of BYU's Kyle Collinsworth, the career triple-double leader with 12. He had six apiece in each of his last two years, while this season only two players (Massachusetts-Lowell's Jahad Thomas and North Carolina State's Dennis Smith) have done it more than once.

All statistics courtesy of Sports-Reference.com, unless otherwise noted. All recruiting information courtesy of Scout.com, unless otherwise noted.

Follow Brian J. Pedersen on Twitter at @realBJP.