It’s Better To Be First At The End

Grayson Allen was a solid choice in the 2017 preseason for ACC player of the year, just as either North Carolina’s Joel Berry II and Notre Dame’s Bonzie Colson II make sense for that minor honor in 2018. (The ACC doesn’t even list the preseason picks in its media guide.)

Of course Allen had a trouble-plagued junior year. He didn’t build on his first team All-ACC performance as a sophomore, or live up to his ‘17 preseason billing as the best the conference had to offer.

As it turns out, in failing to follow through on his preseason selection as ACC player of the year, Allen was hardly setting a precedent.

Since 2000, only four preseason choices as the ACC’s best finished as the player of the year: Duke’s cerebral forward Shane Battier in 2001, when he shared the honor with North Carolina’s forgettable Joseph Forte; Duke’s sharpshooting guard J.J. Redick in 2006, winner in 2005 as well and the most recent of the league’s 10 repeat players of the year; Carolina’s relentless forward Tyler Hansbrough in 2008; and heady Virginia guard Malcolm Brogdon in 2016. Brogdon, a second-round draftee, was the 2017 NBA rookie of the year.

Hansbrough was the preseason pick three straight years but won a single time. Duke’s Kyle Singler and UNC’s Marcus Paige were predicted twice each to finish as the ACC player of the year and never fulfilled that promise.