BYU Basketball

BYU is days away from officially kicking off its 2014-15 basketball season, and fans can hardly wait. This year's team is as deep as any under 10th-year head coach Dave Rose, and the schedule boasts several big-name squads.

But how well do fans really know the Cougars? One can only draw so many conclusions from exhibition games and past seasons.

So if you are the type of fan lacking a taste for this year's squad, here is a complete scouting report for the 2014-15 BYU basketball team.

Note: Not every BYU basketball player is included. Only those who will legitimately make a case for playing time this season are listed below. A full roster can be found here.

Point Guards

Despite losing Matt Carlino, BYU returns last year's starter at point guard, Kyle Collinsworth, and several others who can play the position. Health will be crucial for KC and the guards, but they are set to have a good season.

Kyle Collinsworth (Jr.)

Following a knee injury in last year's West Coast Conference championship game, Collinsworth has recovered and is cleared to play on Saturday. He is one of the most versatile players in the country—his aggressive style and 6'6" frame makes him a unique point guard. 

KC isn't the type of guard who is known for his handles or crossovers. Despite not being a "flashy" player, Collinsworth has the speed to get past defenders and is physical enough to finish and rebound. He has good court vision—he led BYU in assists last season—and although he is a perimeter player, he averaged eight rebounds per game.

Collinsworth benefited from Rose's zone defenses last season, which helped him tally 57 steals. With Rose trying to install more man-to-man schemes this year, KC may be exposed as an average defender. Anyhow, Collinsworth is set for a big season and should impress a lot of people this season.

Anson Winder (Sr.)

Winder has never really found his niche in Provo, as he's been drowned in the depth chart for the past few seasons. He should get more playing time this winter—at both point guard and shooting guard—and could be primed for a breakout season.

There may not be a better one-on-one defender on BYU's roster than Winder, and he will surely get several chances to prove it this season. The biggest question mark for him is his scoring ability, and although he could compete with Tyler Haws as BYU's top free-throw shooter, his all-around scoring skill set is questionable.

Jordan Chatman (Fr.)

As the son of a former BYU legend, Jordan Chatman already has a common name in Provo. He was Washington's Gatorade Player of the Year in high school, but as a true freshman, he still has a lot to prove.

He definitely is one of the better ball-handlers the Cougars have, and at 6'5", he is a big point guard (like Collinsworth). Chatman will surely make a case for playing time this season and may even move into the backup point guard spot.

Wings (Shooting Guards/Small Forwards)

Tyler Haws returns as one of the nation's elite shooters, and there are several potential starters at the other wing position. Rose has no shortage of depth here.

Tyler Haws (Sr.)

As a reigning honorable mention All-American and the WCC's Player of the Year, there is definitely plenty of hype surrounding Haws. He is an innovative, all-around scorer and could definitely make a name for himself this season.

Haws is known as a mid-range sniper, but it seems like he's evolved his game to be a freakishly efficient three-point shooter. Coupled with his ability to finish and knock down free throws, don't be surprised if Haws averages over 25 points per game this season.

The biggest question mark in his offensive arsenal is his ability to create space for his jump shot. He isn't a great ball-handler and is at his best coming off screens. If he can find ways to create his own shot, he will quickly become one of the premier scorers in the nation.

Chase Fischer (Jr.)

A transfer from Wake Forest, Fischer could prove to be a great complement to Haws' scoring prowess. He is a proven shooter with deep range and a crafty finisher off of the dribble.

Fischer was West Virginia's Gatorade POY in high school but had a limited role at Wake Forest. He was used primarily as a shooter off the bench.

The biggest hurdle Fischer will have to jump is finding his role in Rose's scheme. He is already in his second year in Provo—he redshirted last year—but could prove to be one of BYU's best scorers.

Skyler Halford (Sr.)

Halford averaged seven points in 15 minutes played per game last season. He will likely see more playing time this year, and his numbers should go up.

As a former JUCO standout, Halford is a shoot-first scorer who can put up numbers on any given night. He may even see playing time at the point guard position considering his ability to see the floor and BYU's depth at the wing positions.

Frank Bartley IV (So.)

There's a good chance that Bartley could be the surprise star of the season. A 6'3" guard from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, he saw sporadic playing time last season but should get a more consistent spot in the rotation this winter.

Bartley is a versatile athlete who can play at any guard or wing position. He fits right in with Rose's high-tempo offensive system and is an elite scorer in the paint. If he can fine-tune his shooting, he could become a starter at some point.

Jake Toolson (Fr.)

Despite being a true freshman, Toolson is a Division I-ready scorer and a decent defender. He put up 12 points in BYU's first exhibition game and looks like he could be a deadly three-point shooter off the bench this season.

Dalton Nixon (Fr.)

Fresh off a Latter-day Saints mission, Nixon is another freshman who could make a big impact this season. He is one of BYU's better perimeter defenders but is also a smooth-stroking shooter and able rebounder.

Power Forwards/Centers

Last season's starting center, Eric Mika, left on an LDS mission in the spring. Nate Austin, among others, will be back to replace him and could assemble a dominant Cougars frontcourt. The bigs have already been plagued with injuries, but if they can stay healthy, this may be the deepest lineup BYU has seen in a long time.

Nate Austin (Sr.)

Austin is a dominant rebounder and physical defender, but he lacks a consistent offensive skill set. He scored in double figures only twice last season and averaged twice as many rebounds as he did points per game (7.9 RPG, 3.6 PPG).

There's no doubt that assistant coach Mark Pope has worked with Austin during the offseason, and hopefully, that will show in the next few months. Austin is a great rebounder, and even if he doesn't prove to be a consistent scorer, he will help BYU with his physicality and hustle. 

Luke Worthington (So.)

Despite seeing limited action in games last season, Worthington will get plenty of chances to shine this winter. He is not a flashy scorer—his hair may be more famous than his jump shot—but he, like Austin, will help BYU with hustle plays and rebounding.

Worthington is one of the several big men who will fight for the starting frontcourt spot next to Austin. He runs the court as well as anyone, and that could prove to help his case for playing time.

Josh Sharp (Sr.)

In what seems like Sharp's 50th season at BYU, he will (once again) be a role player for the Cougars. He is a rare player—generously listed at 6'7", he is small for a power forward but doesn't have the offensive skill set to play on the wing.

Sharp will definitely get some playing time this season. He probably won't find himself in the starting rotation, but as a solid defender and decent rebounder, he will get minutes as a backup power forward.

Jamal Aytes (So.)

A transfer from UNLV, Aytes is a physical, undersized frontcourt commodity. Despite being listed at 6'6", he weighs 225 pounds and can post up as well as most 6'10" players.

Because of transfer rules, he is ineligible to play until mid-December. Health issues have pushed that date back until January.

Getting Aytes ready to go and on the court will be huge for the Cougs.

Corbin Kaufusi (Fr.)

Coming from a well-known family at BYU, Kaufusi will try to live up to the expectations set by his parents and siblings. As a freak athlete at 6'10" and 245 pounds, Coach Rose dished out an impressive comparison recently (via KSL.com):

"(Corbin) reminds me a lot of Hakeem Olajuwon when I was playing with him in college," Rose said. "Just the fact that he's so young, so raw and so active. He has not (had) a lot of basketball experience behind him, but he really at times can dominate certain parts of a pickup game or a short scrimmage."

Kaufusi's athleticism brings a lot to the table, but he will have to expand his fundamentals and all-around game before getting significant playing time.

Isaac Neilson (Fr.)

Following a two-year LDS mission, Neilson redshirted last season and will provide depth to BYU's frontcourt. He can run the floor as well as any center, and if he can prove to be a physical defender, he may sneak into Rose's rotation.

After an 8-3 start to the season in which all three losses came against ranked teams, BYU hit a bit of a rough patch. The Cougars lost their next four games, including three to teams that they were heavily favored to beat (Utah, Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine).

While the losses to LMU and Pepperdine were quite harmful for both the Cougars' conference title and NCAA tournament aspirations, the team has now given good cause to stop despairing, at least for the moment. 

The Cougars snapped their four-game losing streak in emphatic fashion on Saturday, getting their first conference win by blowing out San Diego at home in the Marriott Center, 87-53.

Despite the team's recent struggles, over 15,000 fans came out to watch the Cougars, and they were not disappointed.

Skyler Halford had the best game of his young BYU career so far, as the junior college transfer scored 28 points on 11-of-16 shooting, including shooting 50 percent from behind the arc.

BYU dominated the Toreros in almost every statistical category. Rebounding was 45-27 in BYU's favor, and the assists were 25-11 in its favor.

BYU was also on fire from the field, as the Cougars shot 53 percent overall and 47 percent from the three-point line. The Toreros, meanwhile, had no such hot hand. USD shot only 34 percent overall, 11 percent from behind the arc and 61 percent from the free-throw line.

Whether the Cougars will continue winning after this game has yet to be seen, but at least for the moment, BYU fans can breathe a sigh of relief.

During BYU Basketball's annual media day, head coach Dave Rose announced this season's team captains (h/t Salt Lake Tribune).

Junior guards Matt Carlino and Tyler Haws will be joined as captains by sophomore guard Kyle Collinsworth in his first season back with the team after completing his LDS mission.

This year's BYU team is unique in that there are no seniors on the roster. However, the selection of Haws, Carlino and Collinsworth as captains is hardly surprising.

Haws served as a team captain last year despite not having had a full offseason to train after completing his mission. It's not hard to see why, considering he was statistically one of the best players in the country last season.

Haws finished seventh in the country in scoring and first in the West Coast Conference. He had 25 games in which he scored 20 or more points and averaged 21.7 points per game on the season.

Part of his scoring prowess came from his impressive proficiency from the free-throw line.  Haws was second in the WCC in free-throw percentage and 17th in the country, shooting .877 from the charity stripe.

Haws also averaged 4.6 rebounds, 2.0 assists and 1.3 steals per game.

Carlino is in his third season at BYU after transferring from UCLA during a redshirt freshman season. The Cougars' point guard has frustrated fans during his time in Provo with his inconsistency but started to find his stride last season, especially towards the end.

During BYU's 2012-13 campaign, Carlino averaged 11.5 points, 4.8 assists, 3.6 rebounds and 1.8 steals per game. His 64 steals on the season were the fourth-best total in school history, and his 171 assists place him third in school history in that category.

During BYU's NIT run, Carlino was a force to be reckoned with, averaging 18 points and eight assists per game in the tournament.

Collinsworth has only one season of NCAA experience under his belt, but it came during BYU's 2010-11 season that saw the school make it to the Sweet 16 and engulfed the country in Jimmermania.  Collinsworth proved to be versatile, playing more of a forward position for the team once they started losing big men left and right.

He averaged 5.8 points, 5.1 rebounds, and 2.1 assists per game in his one season with BYU. Those numbers reflect a player who came off the bench for most of the season until he was forced into a starting role late in the season due to the lack of size the Cougars were dealing with.

Head coach Dave Rose released BYU's nonconference schedule for the 2013-2014 season on Thursday. The schedule consists of six home games, three road games and four neutral-site games.

BYU will open the season on November 8 against in-state foe Weber State. On November 11, the Cougars will travel to Palo Alto to take on Stanford as part of the ESPN Tip-Off Marathon.

There will then be three consecutive home games on November 14, 16 and 20. The first two of those will be part of the CBE Hall of Fame Classic Tournament, and BYU's opponents for those games have yet to be decided. The November 20th game will see the Cougars host the Iowa State Cyclones, who beat BYU last season in Iowa.

The Cougars will then travel to Kansas City for the final two games of the CBE Hall of Fame Classic Tournament. On November 25 they will face the Texas Longhorns, and on November 26 they will face either the DePaul Blue Demons or the Wichita State Shockers, who reached the Final Four of last season's NCAA tournament.

On November 30 the team will travel to Salt Lake City to play a neutral-site game against the in-state Utah State Aggies. That will be followed by a return to the Marriott Center for a home game against North Texas on December 3.

Next up is a trip to Springfield, Massachusetts, the birthplace of basketball, for a "neutral-site" game against nearby UMass on December 7. Following that is a home game against Prairie View A&M on December 11.

December 14 will see the Cougs once again travel up to Salt Lake City, this time to play against hated rival Utah on the Utes' home court. The nonconference slate then wraps up with a game at Oregon on December 21.

Aside from the North Texas and Prairie View games, there are very few "gimme" games on the Cougars' nonconference schedule this season, which should lead to some exciting basketball for BYU fans.

On Wednesday, Aug. 14, the NCAA released attendance figures from the 2012-13 college basketball season. It should come as no surprise that Kentucky, Syracuse, Louisville, North Carolina and Indiana comprised the top five in average home attendance last season.

What may come as a surprise is which school had the highest average home attendance of all the teams in the western U.S.

That would be BYU with an average of  15,986 fans per home game, giving the Cougars the 13th-best home attendance average in the nation.

If you can't recall much of BYU last season, it's probably because the Cougars didn't exactly grab national headlines. They finished third in the West Coast Conference and missed the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2006, although the team did wind up making it to the semifinals of the NIT.

So, how did a third-place team from a small conference which failed to make the NCAA tournament rank in the top 15 in average home attendance?  Surely, that must be a fluke.

Except it's not.

By looking at attendance averages and on-court results over the last five seasons, we see that BYU's appearance in the top-15 nationally is no outlier and is part of an overall pattern of high attendance at the school.

BYU has finished in the top-25 nationally for average home game attendance in each of the past five seasons.  The lowest the Cougars finished in the attendance rankings during that time was the 2008-2009 season, when they were 24th nationally with an average of 13,383 fans per home game.

That same season, the Cougars were co-champions of the Mountain West Conference, along with New Mexico and Utah.  The Cougars went 25-8 overall, bowing out in the first round of the NCAA tournament to Texas A&M in Philadelphia.

That success resulted in an increase in BYU attendance the following season. The Cougars finished 17th nationally in average home attendance in 2009-10, averaging 14,029 fans for an increase of about 650 fans per game over the previous season.

In the 2009-10 season, the Cougars were second in the Mountain West behind New Mexico with an overall record of 30-6, as they finished the regular season at No. 17 in the AP poll. The Cougars posted their first NCAA tournament win since 1993 with a thrilling double-overtime win over Florida in the first round, before losing to Kansas State in the second round.

That set up BYU for monumental success in 2010-11 , both in the stands and on the court.  Fueled by Jimmermania, the Cougars' home attendance average swelled to 18,714, an increase of 4,685 per game, to give BYU the NCAA's highest average home attendance increase from the previous season. BYU finished sixth nationally in home attendance that season, averaging just over 200 fans fewer than fifth-place Tennessee.

BYU split the Mountain West title with San Diego State that season, as star point guard Jimmer Fredette was named the NCAA Player of the Year in NCAA men's basketball. The Cougars ranked 10th in the final regular season AP poll before going on a run in the NCAA tournament.  The Cougars defeated Wofford in the first round and blew out Gonzaga by 22 points in the second round before losing in overtime to Florida in the Sweet 16.

The graduation of Jimmer and the school's all-time steals leader, Jackson Emery, inevitably led to a downturn in the 2011-12 season, but the Cougars remained high in the average attendance rankings, finishing 12th at home with 15,424 fans per game.

Despite a third-place finish in their new West Coast Conference, the Cougars made the NCAA tournament with a regular season record of 25-8. The Cougars mounted the largest comeback ever in an NCAA tournament game to beat Iona in their First Four matchup before losing to Marquette in the next round.

That brings us to last season. Despite missing the NCAA tournament for the first time since 2006 and failing to reach 25 wins for the first time in seven seasons, the Cougars still saw an increase in attendance. BYU averaged 15,986 fans at home, an increase of over 500 fans per game from 2011-12.

Last season's attendance low for BYU came early in the season against Georgia State, when 13,181 fans showed up to the Marriott Center to watch the Cougars throttle the Panthers.  Despite mounting losses, the team continued to draw fans, including 17,342 against Northern Arizona just two days after Christmas when most students were at home.

Even after BYU's disheartening loss to San Francisco at home on Feb. 9, attendance actually increased for the next home game.  One week after being defeated by the Dons, 17,009 fans turned out to watch Dave Rose's squad beat Portland for an increase of over 1,500 fans.

Suffice it to say, it appears that BYU's time in the top-15 of the national average attendance rankings is unlikely to come to an end anytime soon. After bringing in a highly touted recruiting class, the Cougars are likely to see another increase in attendance this season.

The BYU Cougars are a force to be reckoned with when it comes to drawing fans, so don't be surprised by their top-15 attendance ranking this season. It's hardly a fluke.

BYU's Jennifer Hamson was an absolute terror on the court last season as a junior. The 6'7" opposite totaled 458 kills with a 4.09 kills-per-set average and a .362 hitting percentage.  She also added 328 blocks and 206 digs en route to helping lead the Cougars to a 28-4 record, a share of the West Coast Conference title and a Sweet 16 appearance in the NCAA tournament.

Her performance didn't go unnoticed, as she was named the West Coast Conference Player of the Year and a First-Team All-American by the American Volleyball Coaches Association.

Hopes were high for Hamson as she prepared to return for her senior season. 

Those hopes will have to be postponed now, as Hamson announced this week that she will be redshirting this upcoming season and will play out her final year of eligibility in 2014, according to Jay Drew of The Salt Lake Tribune.

What could cause a first-team All-American to postpone her final year of eligibility?

In Hamson's case, her outstanding talent was actually the cause.

Hamson is also a star center on BYU's basketball team.  She led the WCC in blocks, was second in rebounds, fourth in field-goal percentage and 10th in points in the conference.  That led to her being named to the WCC all-conference team.

Being a two-sport athlete in college is difficult enough.  Being the star player for two different sports teams at your college is nearly impossible.

Hamson chose to separate her senior seasons for the two sports in order to give each the focus they deserve, and to preserve herself.

While Hamson's problem may be fairly unique, she was able to come up with a solution that works.

BYU fans may be sad to see their First-Team All-American sit out this season, but Hamson did what was best for her and both of her teams.