FanPost

Russ Smith, National Player of the Year, says Ken Pom.

Now I'm getting this news second hand, per Eric Crawford at WDRB.

-- Russ Smith of U of L finished the regular season atop Ken Pomeroy's statistical Player of the Year standings. Pomeroy in 2010 attempted to provide a pure statistical measure, suing a combination of a player's offensive rating and possessions used, and on defense using a method of calculating "stops responsible for." In Pomeroy's explanation, then ranking is "a standalone honor designed to identify the most valuable player in the game, free of reputation, future potential, or amount of times the player appears on Big Monday. I'll track the candidates every week until tourney time, and then we'll have a season-ending awards ceremony two days after the title game."

Smith stands at No. 1 entering the postseason, followed by Cody Zeller of IU, Trey Burke of Michigan, Mason Plumlee of Duke and Kelly Olynyk of Gonzaga. The second five are Deshaun Thomas (Ohio State), Doug McDermott (Creighton), Otto Porter (Georgetown), Victor Oladipo (Indiana) and Jamaal Franklin (San Diego State).

So, I can't find the numbers to see the differences on the KenPom site. Is that behind his pay wall, under Player Stats?

Also, on his blog he did release his first-team all-conference selections and tournament predictions. So again, we have Russ and Gorgui first team all-BE, by the numbers. Looks like the coaches got that right at least.

Anyway... Russ, PotY for combined offense and defense... just like we all predicted.