KU Rank 3: Wayne Selden

3. Wayne Selden | Sophomore | 2013-14 #KURank: 4

A quick google search for "Wayne Selden knee" reveals any number of articles about how Selden struggled last season mostly due to his knee and how said knee is now fixed and as a result Selden has more bounce. An instagram video he released over the summer certainly seemed to confirm that.

For the most part Selden underwhelmed last season, but there are plenty of reasons to be positive. For one, he shot 53% from two, and 69% at the rim. Unfortunately, hopefully due to the knee (and that can be peppered into all of the negative reviews of his performance last year) he only got to the rim for 24.5% of his shots. Both due to his knee and the offense, Selden was mostly relegated to a spot up shooter role, taking almost half his shots from beyond the arc, and shooting just 32.8% from three.

If Selden's knee proves to be healthy, and he adds some explosiveness as a result, he can raise his eFG (51.3% last year) another few percentage points. I also believe a healthy knee will help his three point shooting as well. If his knee was twinging on every few shots (or every shot for that matter) I can only imagine how that would be in the back of his mind as he was shooting and thus affecting his shot.

Selden has been discussed as a backup point guard option, and while he might get some time there, I think his passing ability has gotten a bit overrated due to his ability to make outstanding passes:

On the season, though, Selden had just a 15.2% assist rate coupled with a 20.2% turnover rate. While he wasn't the nominal point guard in the offense, I don't think role is an excuse as to why his assist numbers were so low.

Defensively was another issue for Selden. He got lost numerous times when guarding off the ball and as a result was slow to rotate over.

He also had some struggles getting lost following his man around screens:

while his on ball defense wasn't as bad as his off ball defense, he had issues in that area at times as well:

I stated on the basketball preview podcast that I think the perimeter defense will be better this year, and a big part of that is my belief that Selden will be able to better defend off the ball and be able to rotate into the lane, but he'll need to improve both there and on the ball to prevent some of the breakdowns Kansas had on that side of the ball last year.

Selden has the ability to lead the team in scoring. He is impressively strong and can score through contact, and he's had a couple streaks of hot three point shooting. Still, Kansas fans who expect Selden to be very good this year (and I am obviously in that camp) are banking a lot on his knee both being healthy and being at the root of a lot of his problems last season.